


Not What Could Have Been

by really_need_a_hobby



Category: Mighty Ducks (Movies)
Genre: Adulthood, Angst, Complicated Relationships, Drug Abuse, Flashbacks, Gen, Glory days gone by, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-04
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-03-12 22:13:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 26,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13556649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/really_need_a_hobby/pseuds/really_need_a_hobby
Summary: A glimpse into the life of Adam Banks years after a devastating injury brought his hockey dreams to an abrupt end.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Standard disclaimer: I don't own The Mighty Ducks. I don't own the characters. I don't own anything mentioned in this story.
> 
> Actually, strictly speaking, I probably own lots of the things mentioned in this story: For instance, I too own a car. I too live in a house. Once upon a time, I too owned a Rolex, a Burberry scarf, and a sandwich. But I don't exactly own the intellectual property rights to any of those things. If I did, I'd be chilling on my private island instead of writing crappy fanfiction about other bitter, overworked adults.

_“With our first pick in the 2001 draft, the St. Louis Blues are proud to select Adam Banks…”_

Bzzz Bzzz Bzzz Bzzz

For a brief, wonderful moment, the sound of the alarm clock didn’t fully register in Adam’s mind. He was still 20 year old. Still reveling in being a first round draft pick—fourth overall, no less. The whole world ahead of him.

Bzzz Bzzz Bzzz Bzzz

And then, as consciousness came back to him, so did the pain. There were the standard aches and pains of getting older. And the pains of a body that had been battered in every way imaginable over the years; a youth spent jumping out of trees and getting crushed on the ice and drunkenly sledding down the fraternity house stairs in a plastic kiddy pool all catching up to him. The worst of all, though, was the nerve pain. That was the pain overwhelmed every fiber of his being, and never quite let go. The first moment he felt it, he thought he was going to die…and after more than eleven years, he often wished he would have.

Slowly, he opened his sleep encrusted eyelids and looked around the room. The only source of light was the amber glow of his alarm clock, the square orange numbers telling him that it was 5 A.M. Time to get out of bed and face another wonderful day of being Adam Banks.

Bzzz Bzzz Bzzz Bzzz

Before he could even be bothered with silencing the incessant alarm, his hand fumbled around the top of the nightstand in search of the right pill bottle.

_“Oh Oxycontin, when did you become my one true love?”_ He thought to himself, quickly grabbing several pills and throwing them in his mouth.

For another ten minutes, he just laid there, his eyes slowly adjusting to the dark room. This morning, there wasn’t any light from the moon, just a faint warm glow from the street light five houses down. Still, that was enough light for him to make out the champagne and white stripe of his curtains, and the awkwardly narrow brick two-story across the street, with the garish robin’s egg blue door that was inspired by the lady of the house’s Pinterest obsession.

_God this town’s an embarrassing shithole._

He longed for the stately seven bedroom Georgian Colonials and Federalist Revivals twenty miles away, where the neighborhoods had patina and the housewives didn’t occupy themselves with ill-conceived $30 “home improvement” projects they’d seen online.

_Pinterest should go to hell._

_Never mind. I live in hell, and I don’t want to be neighbors._

_Pinterest should go to a different hell. A hell reserved for people who name their kids Braydenton and put stick figure families on the back of their cars._

_In other words, the assholes across the street._

Eventually he forced himself to leave the minor refuge of his down comforter and Egyptian cotton sheets, and slowly made his way over to the cramped bathroom, cane in hand. Turning on the light, he blinked several times, the sudden artificial brightness temporarily searing his retinas.

_Damn fucking morning._

Still blinded by the harsh bathroom light, he reached across the grey and white marble counter for the crystal lowball glass containing his front teeth. Putting them in, he mentally cursed the fact that he’d come to live out one of his least favorite hockey clichés.

_I thought you were supposed to at least get to keep your teeth until you made it to the pros. Rich and toothless is a fair enough trade off. Poor and toothless is just being a meth addict without the fun of meth._

His eyes slowly adjusting to the light, he looked back up, staring at his reflection in the mirror, taking the mental inventory he took every morning.

_God I look like shit._

Traces of his boyish good looks remained, but at 31, the years had taken their toll. Decades of eschewing sunscreen had left him with a number of wrinkles that he found cruelly ironic for someone who’d spent his life in a frozen tundra. Between the various high school mishaps, the halo, and the neck surgery, scars etched a roadmap of bad luck and bad decisions across his once perfect, porcelain skin. The sparkle that had given his baby blues such magic had been extinguished, leaving his eyes with the same cold, dead quality as his father and brother’s. And, even with his teeth in place, his upper lip drooped just a hair on the left side, giving his smile a slight crookedness that made him long for his old smile—the one where his lip worked properly, and his teeth didn’t live in a crystal tumbler at night.

_Not that anything else works properly..._

Looking down, he sighed. If the past decade had been hard on his face, it had been downright murderous on his body.

The perfectly chiseled six pack Julie Gaffney had once loved to trace with her fingers had been replaced by the pudge that comes with spending all day in a chair, and his right arm now hung uselessly by his side like an overcooked spaghetti noodle. He’d become something of an expert at finding clothes that hid all of that—long sleeves and carefully selected layers went a long way towards giving the illusion of a marginally fit, athletic body, but he knew what was underneath the button downs and Brooks Brothers jackets, and he hated it. There was nothing he could do about any of it, but it still taunted him, constantly reminding him of his multitude of failures as a man.

Before long, he was fumbling with the buttons on his white oxford, and muttering a variety of expletives as he attempted to perfect the Windsor knot in his navy and maroon tie, cursing under his breath as his efforts proved fruitless.

_What kind of limpdick can’t even dress himself?_

Sacrificing what little was left of his pride, he trudged into the kitchen to ask his wife Laura if she could help straighten his tie.

Looking at her, he sighed. “Dumb fucking cunt.”

As usual, she was already dressed for the day—this time in a tortoise shell headband, pearls, and a sweater featuring a toucan playing hockey. The absurdity of her sweater only seemed to reinforce the notion that he’d failed in some profound way; the quirks that once seemed whimsical now left him feeling like a four year old asking for help with his juice box.

“What?” She asked, noticing his expression.

“That sweater.”

“It’s great, isn’t it?” She insisted, her usual cheeriness refusing to be dampened by another one of his moods. “I found it on clearance at Neiman Marcus—can you believe something like this was 80% off?”

“I’m as shocked as you are.”

“Come on, it’s a toucan playing hockey! And it’s cashmere! And it was only $40! What’s not to love?”

I can think of quite a few things…

His tie finally adjusted, he trudged his way over to the kitchen bar and sat down to eat the breakfast she had prepared. Staring down at the delicate bone china plate filled with a mountain of overcooked scrambled eggs, he sat there and sulked, too annoyed at the poor breakfast selection to pick up his fork.

“Would it really be that hard to make something edible every once in awhile?”

“Eggs are edible.” Laura sighed, refusing to look up from granite counter she was busy scrubbing. “That’s why they sell them at the grocery store, as opposed to say, the hardware store.”

“I hate eggs. Why didn’t you make pancakes, or biscuits and gravy?”

“Because if you ate pancakes every day, you’d look like your brother.”

“What, so now you’re saying Scott’s fat?”

He knew this was a stupid argument. Of course Scott was fat—the guy had been eating his feelings and guzzling cheap beer by the case since was 10. And yes, he was also well aware that if he was already upset about his expanding midsection, eating pancakes every day was not going to help the situation. Logic, however, was not going to stand in the way of an argument.

“I’m not saying Scott’s fat…”

Yeah you are. Get him a toupee and he could be Chris Christie’s body double.

“You’re saying I can’t have pancakes, because if I do, I’ll look like him.”

“Well fine, tomorrow I’ll fix pancakes.”

“Good.”

That argument out of his system, Adam went back to angrily picking at the eggs on his plate while Laura poured herself a mimosa, already feeling the tedium of the day setting in. She tried, but no matter what she did, he always found something to gripe about. If it wasn’t eggs, it was the orange juice. Or the maple syrup. Or the president. Or the color of the sky. Or the fact that he thought Florida was a stupidly shaped state.

That had been an actual argument the week before. Florida’s shape. She only wished it had been their dumbest argument of the month.

“Tucker!” He suddenly shouted, throwing his fork down on the counter and getting up from the white kitchen stool where he’d been sitting.

“What Adam? He’s sleeping.”

“That spelling test. You didn’t think to tell me he made an 80%?” He pointed at a spelling test hanging on the stainless refrigerator, one word misspelled.

“He’s in kindergarten. He got one letter wrong. I think life will go on.”

“How the hell do you misspell ‘is’? It’s two fucking letters. Do you not go over his school work with him?”

“I repeat, dear. He’s. In. Kindergarten.”

“And that’s an excuse to be a worthless idiot? I expect better. Of both of you. You’re home all day—how hard would it be to try actually raising our kids for once?”

“Tucker!” He shouted again, painfully limping his way towards the bottom of the staircase. “Tucker, get your ass down here right this damn minute!”

“Oh for God’s sake, Phil.” Laura snapped, grabbing his elbow as he tried to make his way through the kitchen to the landing of the foyer. “Shut the hell up and go to work.”

Angrily, he jerked away from her loose grip, losing his limited balance and face planting to the floor in the process. For a good five minutes, he just laid there against the cheap laminate, too angry to swallow his pride and let Laura help him back up. Her help was a blow to his ego on a good day. At the moment, it sounded worse than having to saw off his own manhood with a butter knife.

Unfortunately for him, as the minutes slowly ticked by, there was no denying what had to be done. Try as he might, he wasn’t going to be getting off that floor by himself. As he reluctantly asked her for help, he understood deeply what Aron Ralston must have felt on that mountain, the primary difference being that Aron Ralston left the mountain a man. Adam would never get to be a man, just a washed up loser who couldn’t even stand up by himself.

Finally freed from his imitation oak captor, he sulked towards the mudroom and grabbed his coat, muttering “cum guzzling bitch” as he slammed the door loudly enough to wake the two sleeping children upstairs, as well as several angry neighbors.

* * *

 

January, 2001

“So, what’s the first thing you’re going to want me to buy you?” He smiled, pulling the trim blonde in closer. She smelled of champagne and Chanel No. 5, and all he wanted was to have her in his arms for forever.

“I won’t want you to buy me anything! The only thing I care about having is you.”

“Liar!”

“I’m not lying!” She insisted, snuggling deeper into his strong, hockey toned arms, their bodies sinking further into the leather sofa at his modest off-campus apartment.  
.  
The two had left his fraternity mixer early that night, Adam still exhausted from a grueling practice. It had felt like a crime against college to leave a great party and his adorably toga clad girlfriend at 9:30, but his arm was killing him and he could barely hold his eyes open. Reluctantly, he’d told everyone goodbye for the evening, and slipped out the door, determined not to ruin Laura’s good time just because he was overdue for a date with his pillow and an ice pack.

No sooner had he gotten out to his car than he noticed she had followed, braving the subzero wind in just her seersucker toga and nude heels, too afraid that he’d leave without her to take the time to grab her parka.

Taking off his coat to drape around her slender shoulders as they walked back to his car hand in hand, he felt his heart melting. Alone, there was nothing like going home early to remind him of all that he had sacrificed at the altar of ambition, his apartment full of hockey trophies and framed jerseys reminding him of all of the fun childhood memories he didn’t have. With Laura, though, everything felt softer. Cozier. More worthwhile. From the moment he’d first laid eyes on her three months earlier, he’d known she was the one, and as she curled up next to him, the cool metal of her charm bracelet brushing against his skin, he could hardly believe his good fortune.  
.  
“Fine, I’ll just buy you one of everything.”

“Oh yeah, that sounds like a very fiscally responsible move.”

“Okay, fine, I probably picked the wrong sport for literally buying everything.” He laughed, gently entwining his fingers with hers. “But I do want to give you the perfect life.”

“It already is perfect.” She softly replied, her head resting against his shoulder as she stared out the window of the fourth floor apartment. “It already is.”

* * *

  
Collapsing into the battered leather seat of his old Lexus, he pounded the back of his head against the tan headrest, letting out a long sigh at the thought of another fourteen hour day.

_I sure do work hard to be so fucking poor._

Pressing the button for the garage door, he slowly backed out of the driveway, only to carelessly speed through the tired subdivision of cheaply built McMansions and three bedroom/four car garage snout houses. As he passed Buckingham Lane and Windsor Place, he couldn’t help but laugh at the irony of the street names.

_Couldn’t they aim a little lower? Maybe name the streets for places people in this neighborhood have actually seen? Perhaps Lake Michigan Drive? Branson Boulevard? Sizzler Steakhouse Circle? Community College Cove? Suicide Ward Terrace?_

Fiddling with the finicky CD player that had long ago developed a mind of its own, he laughed at the cruel irony of the fact that, as a grown adult, he now drove a car less technologically advanced than the Porsche he’d gotten when he turned 16.

_Then again, it’s not like anything else in my life has improved for the better._

Just as he was about to have to resign himself to another long morning commute of bad talk radio, the worn out CD player decided to comply, Theory of a Deadman’s _Hate My Life_ suddenly blaring through the blown out speakers.

_I hate how my wife_   
_Is always up my ass_   
_She always wants to buy brand new things_   
_But I don't have the cash_

Singing along loudly from the privacy of his car, he was well aware that it was not the most sophisticated song in the universe, but he figured that was fitting, considering that his own life had all the class of a complimentary Kid Rock concert before a Jerry Springer taping.

_Well I hate my job, all of my rich friends_   
_I hate everyone to the bitter end_   
_Nothing turns out right, there's no end in sight_   
_I hate my life_

_“Yes. Yes I do.”_ He thought as he merged onto the interstate, well aware that in another 20 minutes, he’d be trading the hell of lower middle class suburbia for the hell of downtown investment banking.


	2. Before the Fall

After fifteen minutes, the flat suburban landscape gave way to gleaming office towers that illuminated the pre-dawn sky. As a kid, those glittering lights that never turned off gave him hope that there was a world beyond Edina; beyond four hour dinners at the country club. Whenever he’d ride into the city with his parents, he’d sit in the back of his dad’s Mercedes, staring up at those magical, artificial stars, envying his father, and the lush downtown offices that seemed like a window onto the world.

 Now, those same lights were a reminder of life’s never ending drudgery. A reminder that no matter how hard he worked, someone else would always be there to work harder.

 Sighing, he turned off the interstate and onto the labyrinth of one way roads, noting before he even got to a parking space that the Occupy protesters were already out for the morning, ready to heckle frustrated office workers for the 22nd day in a row.

  _Do those fuckers really think that the people going into work at 6 in the morning are the ones running the country? Because I’m pretty sure if I had that kind of power, my first order of business would be setting better hours for myself._

_Well, that or hiring a hotter secretary._

Having secured a parking space, he once again checked his hair in the mirror before making the dreaded journey inside—his sandy blonde shag was the one thing that had survived the decade intact, and he figured that if he was going to be a pathetic washed up loser, he might as well at least be a pathetic washed up loser with good hair.

 “ _See Dad, I do have good qualities_.” He glibly thought to himself as he got out of the car and slowly made his way through the throng of patchouli scented protesters.

  _Also, I know the value of soap. Unlike those stupid assholes._

* * *

April, 2001

 

“ _Today the Minnesota Golden Gophers will be taking on the Wisconsin Badgers in the final game of the NCAA Men’s Hockey Championship.”_

As he sat there on the bench before the final game of his college career, the chilled air in the arena was electric, the stands packed with cheering maroon and gold clad fans, all clamoring for a win. The Frozen Four was down to one game, and either Minnesota or their neighbors to the east would emerge with the national championship. With Charlie and Guy beside him, it was hard to ignore the poignancy of the moment—though he’d never been the Duck diehard that Charlie had been, having one more year with two of his childhood friends had provided a reassuring bit of consistency following his father’s death the previous spring.

 “So, are you still going to remember us little people when you’re even richer than you are now?” Charlie joked, playfully elbowing Adam in the ribs.

 “Wait, who are you?” The former Varsity Warrior captain smiled, his blue eyes twinkling mischievously.

 “Yeah” Guy added, having a rare bit of fun at Charlie’s expense, “nobody wants to remember you!”

 “Assholes.”

 Several of the other players sat quietly, nervous about the outcome of the game. For Adam, though, the mood was more lighthearted than usual—win or lose, he was still a couple of months from going to the NHL. The only question was just how quickly he was going to go in the draft, and judging from all of the media hype, it seemed a foregone conclusion that he was going to go sometime early in the first round.  

 Looking up into the stands, he tried to take it all in. The thousands of cheering fans, a good number of them wearing his jersey. The smiling families in matching maroon and gold sweatshirts, harkening back old memories of watching the Golden Gophers with Larson and his dad, the ever frugal Dr. Larson sneaking snacks in his tattered parka. And, of course, just a few feet away sat his beloved Laura, her perfectly coiffed blonde waves brushing against her maroon fair aisle sweater.

  _God she’s perfect._

Catching her eye, she blew a kiss, which Adam promptly returned, a healthy pinkness overtaking his alabaster cheeks.

 “Good job snagging the one person lamer than you, cake eater.” Charlie laughed, poking fun at the fact that Adam had found the one person preppier than himself.

 Eyeing her pearls and monogrammed Bermuda bag, he just laughed. Charlie had a point.

 And it was wonderful.

 The trim, painfully preppy blonde was no Julie—she was far more interested in working on needlepoint projects and creating the perfect table setting than stopping flying hockey pucks. That was alright with Adam, though. After a certain well meaning goalie had broken his heart, he craved a bit of pillow-y softness, and Laura had provided that in droves, complete with crisp, monogrammed shams. If Charlie and Guy had provided consistency to a life unmoored, Laura provided the warmth for thawing out at the end of the day.

  _I wonder what she’d do if I really did buy her one of everything._

_Maybe someday._

 Skating onto the ice for the faceoff a minute later, the familiar feeling of control and power took over. Off the ice, he’d never quite known what to do with himself—his legs were too long, the right words forever eluded him, and his mind swam with a thousand fears and insecurities. On the ice, though, nobody was better. As the fans wildly cheered, he knew it was his day. A day to be great.

 

* * *

 

 Up in his ninth floor office, he turned on his computer, his fingers impatiently drumming at the cherry veneer desk as he waited for the desktop to start up. Looking around, there was no denying that he hadn’t exactly lived up to his father; this office was distinctly lacking in fireplaces and Georgian paneling. Instead, he was surrounded by bland taupe walls, decorated only with the generic corporate “art” that came with the space. Behind him sat a row of bookshelves that happier men used to display family photos and old sports memorabilia, but that sat empty in his sterile office.

 He didn’t see any point in decorating.

Two years earlier, in his old office, he _did_ have a scattering of family photos in tasteful silver frames—a picture of him and his dad after he led Eden Hall to a national championship his junior year, another of him and Laura on their wedding day, and one of him sitting on a boat at the lake, his two young sons Tucker and William in his lap as the water glistened behind the three of them.

 Then, one day he got mad and smashed all three frames to pieces, then set the photos on fire in the metal trashcan beside his desk. He never replaced any of them.

…

His desktop flickering to life, he quickly checked his email for the morning, then meandered over to Facebook to kill a few minutes before the actual work of the day began. 

_“Ugly baby. Ugly baby.”_ He thought as he scrolled through his newsfeed _. “Really ugly baby. Is that asshole ever NOT on vacation?”_

_Whoa, I need to go on vacation with HER! Yeah Tiffani, keep posting those vacation pictures at the beach…in fact, may I suggest moving to Florida so you can go to the beach every day? Please?_

 Well versed in the inefficiencies of corporate culture, he realized that the number of hours spent _in_ the office often mattered more to upper management than what was done _during_ those hours, and as such, the first hour of every morning and the last two hours of every evening were typically spent on such fruitful activities as checking the ESPN website, silently making fun of ugly families, and drooling over the vacation pictures of women who did not share Laura’s distaste for revealing swimsuits.

 Before long, he caught a glimpse of a headline that ripped his thoughts far away from Tiffani’s beach vacation and Roger’s homely child.

 ‘Germaine Signs $6M Contract with Redwings’.

  _“Well fuck me, asshole.”_ He thought, running his fingers through his neatly combed blonde mop as he leaned back in his office chair.

_I’ve got $86.13, and there is zero chance that’s going to last the rest of the day._

_Maybe I should send these stupid protesters to keep him company. Let him listen to a suburban dumbass with dreadlocks yell at him about how he’s corporate scum. He’s got money, teeth, limbs that work, and a wife who blows him. The least he can do is listen to some basement dweller rattle on about how gender is a construct and all money should be shared equally._

* * *

 

April, 2001

 

“Good luck out there, preppy.” Guy smiled, slapping him on the back.

As Adam skated back onto the ice in the middle of third period, it was starting to appear that God himself had decreed that he should go first overall in the draft—there seemed no other explanation for the star’s performance. While the rest of the Minnesota team had been unusually lackluster, the starting forward had already scored four goals against an impressive (and hard hitting) Badger defense, helping to ease any lingering concerns that his battered body wouldn’t be able to hold up to the brutality of the NHL. After absorbing numerous bone crushing hits, he felt better than ever. Even his thoroughly reconstructed right arm was pain free, an event so rare that he couldn’t remember the last time he’d experienced it.

 Looking up through the maroon cage of his helmet, he could see Laura in the stands, absently adjusting her strand of pearls as she gabbed with a sorority sister. Through the sixth sense that only young love can bring, he once again caught her eye, and from the distance, he could see bringing her thumbs and index fingers together in the shape of a heart. Smiling, he skated towards the faceoff, his cheeks and the tips of his ears warm at the thought of Laura. At the thought of his future.

.

Quickly getting back into his hockey zone, he won the faceoff, steamrolling the Badger center. Expertly, he sailed past the quick defense, and skated towards the Wisconsin net, hoping to soon send the puck sailing in for the fifth time that afternoon.

 Just as he was skating behind the net, he could see a hulking mass of red and black barreling towards him out of the corner of his eye. Before his mind even had time to finish processing what was about to happen, he felt the jarring impact of the 240 lb. defenseman slamming into him at full speed. Almost as if in slow motion, he could feel himself falling, and he knew what was about to happen, yet there was nothing he could do to lessen the horror to come.

 Suddenly, the bottom of his chin crashed against the side of the boards with such force that his teeth were shattered through the mouth guard, and his head flew back at a devastating, inhuman angle. Before his body even hit the ice, he heard a terrifying snap, and his mouth filled with blood.

  _“Please tell me that sound was jaw shattering.”_ He prayed, _“Please God. Please tell me that was just my jaw.”_

His jaw would be fixable. He knew the other possibility was far, far worse.

 His hope was short lived.

A millisecond later, he was struggling to breathe. Everything from his shoulders down had been overtaken by a pain he’d never felt before; it was like the pins and needles of a foot that had fallen asleep, except that the harmless pins and needles had been replaced by ice picks that were on fire, stabbing every inch of his body over and over. He kept waiting for the ice below him to help dampen the fire, but it did nothing.

 In fact, he quickly realized that he couldn’t feel the ice at all.

 Tears filled his soulful baby blues, and he wanted to scream out in agony, but he couldn’t. He could barely catch his breath enough to remain conscious, much less scream. Instead, he just laid there helplessly, begging God over and over for it to all be a dream. For him to wake up, and for everything to be the way it should be.

 


	3. Chapter 3

April, 2001

 

“Well Mr. Banks, do you want the good news or the bad news?”

 Adam could hear the doctor speaking, but he couldn’t see him. With a metal halo immobilizing his head and neck, there was no way to adjust his frame of vision. No way to look at anything but the stark white ceiling tiles above, turning the surgeon into an eerily disembodied voice.

 As he lay there in the hospital bed, he knew from past experience that the sheets were too scratchy, the mattress too stiff. Out of the corner of his eye, he could make out Laura standing beside him, her hand resting on his shoulder. He wanted more than anything to feel those things—to feel the waffle weave blankets against his bare skin, or her silky delicate hand squeezing his arm. He wanted to feel the uncomfortable mattress, and the re-circulated air from the vent above blowing on his exposed hands, and the bruised ribs that he was sure he had from the game. He just wanted to feel _something_ , _anything_ but the fiery ice picks.

 And yet, aside from his broken, bloody mouth, and the bolts drilled into his skull, that was all he could feel.

 “Is there any good news?”

 His soft voice was unsteady as he tried not to cry. He could practically feel his dad looking down on him from the great above, admonishing him not to be a pussy.

  _“Come on, son.”_ He could imagine his father saying in his gruff staccato, _“You’re the dumbass who got yourself into this mess. No use acting like a damn woman about it.”_

As the tears began to well up in his eyes, Laura leaned down and softly kissed his cheek, her long eyelashes fluttering against his nose. Normally, the gesture would have been reassuring, but as he lay there frozen in place, it only served to remind him of all that he was about to lose.

 “Your spinal cord is mostly intact.”

“So…I’ll be okay?” He asked nervously, the slightest hint of optimism returning to his shaky voice for the first time in hours.

 He knew at this point that ‘okay’ was a relative concept; that his life would never again hold the promise that it had just twelve hours earlier. Still, he prayed for good news. He prayed that the disembodied voice would tell him that _this_ was temporary, and that in a few months, he’d be able to go back to something that half resembled a normal life. That he would again be able to feel his girlfriend’s touch, and the smooth Egyptian cotton of his good shirts, and the dampness of the grass on a spring morning.

 “Mr. Banks, your C-4 and C-5 vertebrae were crushed, and your spinal cord was badly damaged. You’re a quadriplegic.”

  _No. Please God. No._

 “However, your injury is an incomplete one. There are a lot of nerves that are still intact, so there’s a chance that with time, you’ll regain some limited function.”

 He wished he could get up and beat the hell out of the faceless doctor. The words themselves were polite enough, but his flat tone reminded him of an automated menu telling him to press 9 to speak with an operator. It was clear that, as far as the surgeon was concerned, telling people their lives were over was just another inconvenience to be suffered before heading out for a round of golf.

“How limited?”

 As soon as the words left his mouth, he regretted it. He wanted to reach out, grab them from the air, and swallow them, so that he’d never have to hear the answer.

 Of course, considering the situation, that fantasy was impossible in more ways than one.

 “Realistically? Best case scenario, you’ll be able to help care for yourself.”

  _Help care for yourself._

 Since the instant he felt his chin collide with the boards, he knew that the future he’d been looking forward to—the future he’d spent his whole life working towards—was over. Still, until the doctor said those words, some tiny piece of him had clung to a faint hope that maybe, just maybe, things would somehow be alright. That even if his NHL dreams were over, that he would at least get to be a normal person. That he would get to go back and enjoy all of the fraternity parties he’d missed out on, and that he’d get to ask Laura to marry him, and that he’d get to hold his kids one day, and buy a big fancy house out in the suburbs, and go to their hockey games once they were old enough.

 As the disembodied voice uttered those words, he watched all of those hopes and dreams disappear.

  _Help care for yourself._

As he laid there that morning, he knew a piece of his soul had died right along with everything else.

* * *

 

 

“You want to explain these numbers to me?” His boss, Bob, demanded. With every word, the man’s jowls flapped as the veins in neck bulged, forever leaving Adam concerned that one day the man’s head would finally explode, showering him in a mixture of blood and lard. “You want to tell me what the hell I’m paying you to do? Because this is both of our asses on the line, and I am not afraid to fire you, you stupid son of a bitch. Your dumb ass will be asking people if they’d like fries with that before you can even say ‘unemployment’.”

 Adam silently stared down at his desk, mindlessly rubbing the back of his neck as he waited for the tirade to end.

  _That…literally isn’t possible. ‘Unemployment’ is one word. ‘Would you like fries with that?’ is six. How can saying one word possibly take longer than asking an entire sentence?_

_I think I see why you never quite made it into upper management, Bob._

Ten minutes earlier, Bob had stormed into his office and thrown a stack of earnings reports down onto the desk. Adam knew why Bob was upset—the quarterly earnings _were_ down for the tenth quarter in a row. Adam, however, was not the reason for that—considering the economy, he had actually done quite well. The economy, however, was the major caveat to that statement, and he could no sooner improve the economy than he could control the weather or bring peace in the middle east.

 Bob, of course, didn’t care.

 Much like Phillip, Bob’s penchant for berating those around him had little to with logic, and everything to do with his own personal whims. If _he_ was in a bad mood, he was going to see to it that everyone else around him felt worse, and also like Phillip, that was one thing he truly excelled at.

 “How incompetent can one person be? It’s like you’ve never done anything right in your worthless fucking life.”

  _Is that you, Dad? Have you been reincarnated?_

_Also, no. Of course I’ve never done anything right in my fucking life. That’s obviously why I’m sitting here right now._

Out of the corner of his eye, he couldn’t help but glance over at the window. Outside, the sun shone pleasantly, and happy people were out milling around, taking advantage of one of the last mild days before the full harshness of winter tightened its icy grip.

 “Don’t think I’m afraid to fire you just because of who your dad was or who you were back at University of Minnesota. Because I don’t give a shit. For all I care, you can go suck dick for food, you stupid crippled son of a bitch.”

  _Oh the joys of being the department that HR forgot…_

Just as Adam had always done when he was off the ice, he sat back and nodded apologetically, staring down at the faux wood grain swirls on his desk. There would be no arguing with Bob. There would be no going to HR. While there were a thousand words he wanted to say, there were also a thousand bills that needed to be paid. The mortgage, and Laura’s Mercedes, and Breck School tuition, and hockey equipment and golf lessons for the boys all mattered far more than his pride.

 Everyone else’s needs mattered more than his pride.

 Instead, he just continued to sit there, biting the inside of his lip as he waited for the storm to pass.

  _You know who got lucky? Those high school kids over in Golden Valley who got struck by a train last week._

_Why can’t I ever have anything good like that happen to me?_

_…_

Twenty minutes later, after Hurricane Bob had finally blown over, Adam just sat silently at his desk, his head leaned back, staring blankly up at the ceiling. It was only 8:56. Other people were just getting into work for the morning, and he was already exhausted. He briefly contemplated faking a coma just so he could get a few more hours of sleep, but he quickly realized that the snoring would probably give him away.

  _I should ask Julie if coma patients ever snore…_

 Barring his coma fantasy, he reached into his desk drawer for a bottle of Adderall, sighing as he thought about what a poor substitute for sleep it really was.   

* * *

April, 2001

 

“Julie?”

 As his first love walked into the sun drenched hospital room, he could feel his heart flutter. For months, he’d dreamed of seeing her again, and suddenly there she was, in all of her glory. Standing there in a rumpled Dartmouth sweatshirt, her eyes sleepy and her normally lustrous hair thrown back in an unwashed ponytail, she looked just as she always had during finals. Bathed in the warm morning sunlight, Adam couldn’t help but find himself transported back to Eden Hall. Back to one of their glorious post-finals naps, her perfect, toned body curled up beside him in his tiny dorm bed. Everything still feeling a bit unreal to him, for a brief, wonderful second, he imagined that she would come lie down beside him. That he would wrap his arms around her, and pull her in tightly, and that he would bury his face in her soft hair, and that they would slowly drift off to sleep together with her in his arms.  

 Of course, his fantasy didn’t last long. He knew that this time, she hadn’t stayed up studying trigonometry. She’d stayed up because of him.

 There would be no curling up beside her. There would be no pulling her in tightly; no drifting off to sleep together.

 He knew that he would never be able to do any of those things again—with her or anyone else.

 Before he could stop himself, he again felt his eyes welling up with tears, and for the second time that morning, he was biting into the side of his cheek, doing everything he could to hold back the waterfall of tears he wanted to let out. He kept biting until he could taste blood, determined not to let go of the one piece of dignity he still had left.

  _Come on, Adam. Be a man._

“Oh Adam…”

 Before Julie could get anything else out, she was sitting in the chair beside his bed, her face buried in his stomach as she sobbed. As her shoulders heaved up and down, Adam willed his arms to move—to reach over and stroke her hair; to rub her back until she stopped crying. More than anything—more than to be able to cuddle up next to her, more than to be able to have his own dignity back—he wanted to be able to reach over and make her feel better.

 No matter what he did, though, his arms remained glued to the bed.

 “It’s okay.” He choked out as he held back his own tears. “It’s really not that bad.”

 

…

For the next three days, visitors constantly flowed in and out of his room. Julie. Larson. Fraternity brothers. College teammates. High school teammates. Ducks who he hadn’t seen since his peewee days. Old Hawks. Random acquaintances from all over the city. He even heard from Scott that at one point their mother had tried to come visit, but had ended up visiting a comatose farmer by mistake, absently remarking to her older son that she ‘didn’t remember Adam being so fat or quiet’.

 And then, everyone slowly went back to their lives. Julie went back to Dartmouth. Larson went back to Hampden-Sydney. His old friends and teammates went back to their normal lives of guzzling beer and cramming for tests and all of the other things that he himself wanted to be doing.

 Before long, the world shrank.

 Scott would come by every day after work and stay late into the evening, talking about hot chicks and things he saw on television and how he wished he could tell his boss to blow him. Larson would call every few days, and the two would geek out the way they always had, never quite knowing what to say, but happy to say it. His old acquaintance from high school, Crawford Wellesley, would come by every couple of weeks, and, in true Crawford form, would prattle on mindlessly about golf. But other than that, and Laura, he was alone, left with nothing but his thoughts. The world that had once been so full of people and possibilities was gone, replaced with a barren hospital room and the occasional story about some stripper named Khrystal or Roxxxie.


	4. Chapter 4

Adam sat back in his desk chair, staring at yet another spreadsheet as he shifted around, trying to find a comfortable position. The Adderall he’d taken twenty minutes earlier and the cup of coffee in front of him were doing nothing to cut through the drowsiness that was starting to consume every fiber of his being, his pale eyelids feeling as though they had 100 lb. weights attached.

 Worse, beads of sweat were already starting to run down his forehead as snot dripped down his nose—there in his cool office, it felt like his broken body had turned into Niagra Falls. He reached into his desk and pulled out another pill bottle, staring at the label as he contemplated what to do. Another OxyContin or three would turn off the spigot and cut through at least a little bit of the pain, but it would also slow everything else down. As it was, he was already struggling to stay awake, his sandpaper coated eyes and sleep deprived brain trying in vain to process all of the numbers in front of him.

 Just as he was weighing the misery of withdraw against the near impossibility of keeping his eyes open, his cell phone buzzed.

  _Laura._

“Hey. I’m kind of busy right now. What do you need?”

 As he struggled to wipe his nose while holding the phone with his one useful hand, he could hear her sigh. In the background, it was obvious that Will was throwing another tantrum over _something_.

  _How hard is raise kids who don’t act like a couple of idiots?_

“I don’t _need_ anything, Adam. I was just calling to remind you that Tucker has a hockey game tonight. Do you think you could try to make it?”

 “I have to work, dear.”

 “Look, you’ve missed every game this season…”

  _Ah, and to think that one of the reasons Julie broke up with me was because I ‘wasn’t interested in traveling’. Well guess what, Jules? I get to go on guilt trips every fucking day. How’s that for a sense of adventure, you self-righteous bitch?_

“It would really mean a lot to him if you could make it for at least part of the game. They’re playing an away game against the Panthers, so they’ll literally be three minutes from your office.” She paused for a moment, trying to find the right words.

 “I’m not saying you have to stay there the entire time or anything, just make an appearance. Show up for ten minutes, tell him he did a good job, then you can go back to whatever you feel like doing.”

 Looking out the window, he could see a man pushing a stroller across the crowded sidewalk, a blonde toddler sitting on his shoulders.

 “What I _feel like_ doing? For fuck’s sake, Laura, what the hell do you think I do all day? Do you think I stare at spreadsheets for the fun of it? That I go to work every day because it was this or stamp collecting?”

 Once again, he could hear her sigh.

  _“Come on, cut the guilt trip and quit wasting my time with this stupid shit.”_ He thought, staring back down at the green face of his dad’s old Rolex, the slow sweep of the second hand reminding him of all of the things he needed to be doing.

 “You know perfectly well that is not what I meant.” She replied after a second, the frustration growing more evident in her voice. “You don’t have to be an asshole. I was just wanting to remind you that you have two sons who would really like to see their father every now and then. You know, the two kids who _you_ wanted to have.”

 “What the hell do you want me to do? Quit my job? Move us all into a fucking refrigerator box? We could see a ton of each other then…well, I mean, until we all freeze to death under a damn bridge!”

 “Well shit Adam, considering how often your paycheck goes up your nose, I’m pretty sure that’s what we’re all going to end up doing, anyway. You might as well spend a few minutes of quality time with the boys now so that they’ll have something happy to reminisce on at your funeral.”

  _I’m pretty sure me being gone would be the happy thing. Maybe then they could get a good dad._

 “You know what? You can be a real sanctimonious bitch sometimes.”

 For a moment, there was silence. As he sat there staring at his computer screen, he kept expecting to hear a ‘fuck you’ or ‘go to hell’. Instead, the only sound was Will’s tantrum in the background, followed by the soft click of the call ending a moment later.

  _She hung up on me._

_I’m not even worth arguing with._

 Hunching over at his desk, he buried his face in his hand. His nose slowly dripping onto the sleeve of his cotton dress shirt, his mind drifted away from the world of spreadsheets and bills, back the night he first laid eyes on Laura from across the room of the Sigma Chi basement. He could still smell the cigarette smoke and cheap beer, and hear her laughing with her friends. He could still picture the madras skirt and kelly green sweater she had on, and how in the sea of skin-tight dresses and stilettos, he knew she was _the one_ , finally regaining the warm fluttery feeling he’d last experienced with Julie. And, he could still taste the hot, watered down can of Michelob that he spent three hours nursing in the kitchen alone, too scared to go speak to the girl of his dreams downstairs.

  _“It sure is a good thing I got over that fear.”_ He thought to himself ruefully _._

_Worked out almost as well as overcoming my fear of hockey._

 

* * *

 

April, 2001

 

“Come on, how can Michelangelo be your favorite? It’s like I don’t even know you anymore!” Adam joked, looking over at Laura.

 She was sitting in the chair next to his bed, curled up barefoot under a yellow polka dot blanket she’d brought over from her dorm room. At her feet sat a pair of boat shoes and a monogrammed L.L. Bean tote overstuffed with textbooks, the canvas looking worn from the daily trips back and forth between the university and the hospital.

 “Dude. He likes pizza. I like pizza. He has a colorful vocabulary. He’s good with a set of nunchucks.” She paused thoughtfully for a moment, fluffing a madras throw pillow that sat in her lap. “And you know, technically, he has the most potential, he just hasn’t really tapped into it yet.”

 “But he’s a dumbass.”

 “Well, yeah, but so are you, and I kind of like you, anyway.”

 “I’m not a dumbass like him!”

 “Well, of course you’re not.” She smiled, leaning forward to ruffle his sandy hair. The little silver set of skis on her charm bracelet batted against his eyebrow as she then leaned down give him a quick kiss. “You’re not a turtle, and you can’t use nunchucks. In many ways, you’re a way lamer dumbass than he is.”

 ‘Well darn, I guess you do have a point there.”

 “Don’t worry, you’re also a lot hotter than he is.”

 “That’s…that’s good.” He laughed, a small bit of sparkle returning to his eyes. “I really pride myself on being sexier than the average crime fighting terrapin.”

 “As you should!”

* * *

“I’m going across the street to grab lunch. You need anything, Carol?”

 Standing over the long reception desk, it seemed painfully obvious that Carol had to have been a hire made under orders from someone’s jealous wife. The _other_ secretaries, for _other_ departments, were generally 23 years old, and all shared an affinity for short skirts and breast implants—he often suspected that breast size was actually listed on their resumes, right alongside ‘proficient in Microsoft Word’ and ‘attentive to detail’.

 Supposedly, Lindzee from accounting still had dreams of becoming a cheerleader for the Vikings, and had all of the requisite flexibility such a job would demand.  

 Carol, on the other hand, was 62, favored floral polyester blouses, and enjoyed talking about her grandchildren to anyone who would listen. By mid-day, her mauve lipstick tended to migrate into the wrinkles around her mouth, and her double chin was slowly starting to turn into a triple chin. She was, in other words, _not_ Lindzee.

  _“Too bad, too. Those dorks in accounting wouldn’t know what to do with Lindzee.”_ Adam had thought to himself many a times, occasionally shaking his head at the thought of all of the wasted potential.

_._

Of course, he himself would have been at just as much of a loss had the situation ever presented itself, but he wasn’t about to let reality get in the way of a good fantasy. In his mind, the fact that Julie and Laura were the only girls who he had ever so much as kissed, and the fact that he often had to ask for assistance just to get out of bed were neither one preclusive to the possibility of a naked Cirque de Soleil with Lindzee, complete with complicated handstands and swinging from crystal chandeliers.

 In his imagination, boring details like fidelity, the laws of gravity, structural integrity of light fixtures, and his complete lack of physical prowess all ceased to exist, replaced with images of Lindzee and her tan, supple breasts vigorously bouncing as he proved just what a stud he could be.

  _I could make her forget all about those pom poms. Christian Ponder has nothing on me!_

.

“No dear, I brought a sandwich from home, so I’m fine. Thank you so much for asking, though.”

 “You’re sure?”

 “Of course. Have a wonderful lunch, Mr. Banks.”

 As he slowly made his way towards the elevator, Miss Carol Klugenfelter smiled. After twenty years at the same office, Adam was still the only one who ever bothered to ask how she was doing or whether she needed anything.

* * *

 

 

May, 2001

 “Look, I’m serious. You don’t deserve this.”

 Laura sat at Adam’s bedside, squeezing his fingers as she tried not to cry. It didn’t matter than he couldn’t feel her hand; that he couldn’t feel it as she squeezed his nubby, calloused fingertips, or gently traced the faded pink scar along his wrist with her thumbnail. Whether he could feel it or not, she still needed to touch him.

 “What? And you do? You think you deserve to go through this alone?”

 Adam could barely stand to look at her as he talked. Seeing her sitting there in her navy J. Crew cardigan, her hair pulled back with a tortoise shell clip, he thought of all that he was going to miss. He thought of how he would never again get to be with someone who shared his secret predilection for Troop Beverly Hills, or who understood that _The Wall Street Journal_ _was_ pleasure reading. He thought of the nights spent making blanket forts or jumping into the fountains on campus that they would never again share. He could still hear the sound of her laughter after they snuck into the country club pool for a late night swim under the stars, and the smell of the chlorine as they made out on the concrete steps.

 He’d already lost everything.

 Now, to top it all off, he was going to have to break up with the second girl he’d ever loved. The one person who still brought him some modicum of happiness.

 Sighing, he tried to compose the right words in his mind.

 “Well, of course not, but the difference is, there’s nothing I can do about it. My life is over no matter what. But you?” He paused for a second, the tears starting to well up in his sad blue eyes. “The world is still yours. You can go find a different guy—someone who can buy you a big gorgeous house and a new Range Rover every year, and who can give you a bunch of perfect kids, who’ll all wear perfect little outfits every day, and practice their tennis serves out in the backyard tennis court. It’ll be lovely, and soon, all of _this_ will just be a distant memory.”

  _Fuck._

 Saying those words killed him. He didn’t want to be a distant memory. He wanted Laura. He wanted the palatial eight-bedroom colonial, and the happy, gorgeous wife, and the house full of carefree Polo clad children who thought their dad was amazing. He wanted the life that had been in front of him two weeks earlier.

 And now, all of that was gone.

 He would never be able to have those things…but Laura still could.

 “I’m never the one who wanted that life, Adam! _You’re_ the one who wanted that. I wanted _you_. I wanted us to be happy.”

 He could tell that she was getting angry; that he was hurting her.

 Still, it was for the best.

 “What would make me happy is knowing that you’re out living the life you deserve.”

 In the distance, he could hear that a Code Blue. As he listened to the sound of feet pounding towards the other end of the hallway, he longed to be that patient. For his broken and tattered heart to finally just stop beating all together, and for all of the pain to finally go away. He thought back to the gun Scott always kept in the pocket of his Barbour jacket, and he wished he could move his hands enough to use it.

 


	5. Chapter 5

Walking out the glass doors of the gleaming office tower and into the crisp autumn air, Adam’s once sleepy mind now raced with possibilities, the bright sun and brisk wind giving him a second burst of energy. He could get in his car and drive to somewhere that wasn’t Minnesota; the sunroof open as he headed south, away from winter’s impending grip. He could join Tiffani The Random Facebook Friend on her beach vacation. He could call up Scott and convince him to bring him some coke. He could drive away from his job and never come back. He could go pick Tucker up from school and spend an afternoon with his kids at the park, or take Laura out for a leisurely lunch at The Minnesota Club, the two of them enjoying gin and pleasant conversation over the flickering candlelight. Perhaps he could remind her of the things she’d once liked about him; _maybe_ he could even apologize for a few things.

 

Or he could go across the street and get a sandwich.

 

While that was the least appealing of the possibilities, it also seemed the most sensible. Pulling his Wayfarers from the pocket of his suit jacket and straightening his tan Burberry scarf, he once again made his way through the throng of protesters, doing his best to ignore the scent of body odor and pot smoke as the cool autumn air nipped at his ears and nose.

 

_“I wonder if they would share…”_ He briefly thought as he waited for the blinking light at the crosswalk to change. _“Maybe while we’re at it, I could teach them about the life changing magic of deodorant. Talk about killing two birds with one stone…”_

Still waiting for the light to change, he grimaced a little at the thought of common expression. Ill-tempered though he was, the mention of killing birds (or any other animal) had always bothered him.

 

_Once a Duck, always a Duck…_

_._

Once the light changed, he slowly made his way across the street, the delicious smell of cheesesteak replacing the aroma of hygiene challenged protesters. Standing outside the deli, he smiled as he held the door for a trim brunette with a baby stroller. Deep down, he hoped that nobody could tell how unsteady he was as the edge of the door pushed to his back, threatening to send him toppling forward—holding doors was no longer as simple as it had once been, and on a couple of embarrassing occasions, the doors had won.

 

Still, it was going to take more than the occasional scraped knee and bruised ego to kill his sense of chivalry. His manners, like his good hair, were among the last vestiges of his former self that time and circumstance hadn’t been able to take away, and he wasn’t going to let that go without a fight.

……………….

 

May, 2001

 

“You know what? Time for a study break.”

 

For the previous three hours, Laura had been curled up in the tan vinyl chair next to his bed, an extra pencil tucked behind her ear as she worked on her calculus homework.

 

Despite his best efforts, she had chosen to stay by his side, still making the same trek over to the hospital every afternoon. With finals rapidly approaching, however, the time they’d once spent discussing the Ninja Turtles or reading _The Economist_ had dwindled, replaced instead with her dutifully studying from his bedside, doing her best to drown out the distraction of nurses coming in every twenty minutes to check catheters and move his paralyzed limbs.

 

Setting aside her calculus textbook and blanket, Laura got up and lowered the bedrails. Carefully, she maneuvered around the tangle of wires and tubes and the bulky metal halo to lie down beside him, wrapping an oxford clad arm around his broad, sturdy chest. Though she knew he couldn’t feel it, she draped one leg over his, and gently traced circles along his arm with her fingers, just the way she always had before he got hurt.

 

“I like this study break.”

 

As Adam lay there, the familiar smell of her Chanel perfume replacing the constant scent of hospital antiseptic, he realized that what they were doing was a poor substitute for the way they’d once cuddled—the way that he’d wrap his arms around her, and pull her in tightly, and gently kiss the top of her head as her warm body melted into his. He longed to be able to feel her toes tickling his leg, or to run his fingers through her hair as they kissed.

 

Still, it offered a piece of normalcy. The smell of her perfume, and the feeling of her warm breath on the side of his neck was just enough to remind him that he was still alive. Still a person.

 

“I love you.”

 

“I love you, too.”

 

For the next twenty minutes, the two lay there quietly. In the background, they could hear the various beeps and whirs and scuffling feet that make up life in a hospital, but for a brief time, there, in Room 269, it was just them. Together. Alone. Slowly, they both drifted off to sleep, each temporarily leaving their bleak reality. In their dreams, life was still full of hope and possibility; full of debauchery filled fraternity formals, and the NHL draft, and trips to the beach, and lazy afternoons enjoying the springtime.

.

“Aagh, fucking shit!” Adam suddenly yelped, his short slumber disrupted by a sudden, sharp pain coursing through his hand.

 

Startled, Laura rolled off the bed, landing in a pastel heap atop her blanket and tote bag. Scrambling to her bare feet, she recognized the problem—in her sleep, she’d rolled over onto his hand, accidentally impaling his IV into the surrounding tissues. Already, his hand was starting to swell, a nasty bruise forming where the needle had torn through the opposite side of his vein.

 

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry! Are you alright?”

 

Just as she turned to flag down a nurse, they were both hit by the same realization.

 

Laura turned back around towards him, an incredulous look in her blue eyes. Slowly, a smile crept across her face as her sense of guilt was replaced by something else.

 

“Wait…you can feel your hand?”

 

Suddenly, the rapidly forming bump didn’t seem like a problem in the least. Sitting back down atop the scratchy white hospital sheets, Laura carefully brought his hand to her lips, giving the injured appendage a soft kiss that made him forget all about the lingering soreness. Still not letting go of his long fingers, she leaned over, and, navigating her way around his metal halo, she delivered a kiss that made him _very_ thankful that he could still feel his mouth.

 

“You know, I think you might be a miracle worker.” He laughed, giving a delightfully warm smile. It was the first time he’d truly smiled in over two weeks, and it consumed his entire face, lighting up his eyes and returning a healthy glow to his cheeks.

 

Even with a mouth full of missing teeth, as far as Laura was concerned, he had never looked so handsome.

 

Maneuvering around the obstacle course of medical equipment, she crawled on top of him, resting her weight on her forearms so as not to hurt him again. This time, as she brought her lips to his, she made their last kiss look positively chaste, nineteen days of bottled up feelings having finally found an outlet.

 

Several times, nurses started to come into the room, but as soon as they glanced through the door, they always quietly turned around.

………………….

 

Sitting alone at the table at the deli, surrounded by other tired looking men in tired suits all sitting alone, Adam looked back down at his Rolex.

 

12:40

 

Though he’d barely had time to finish half of his sandwich, it was time to make the journey back to the office. Time to return to the world of spreadsheets and hiding from Bob. Wrapping up what remained of his lunch, he ventured back out into the late October chill, dreading the next seven hours he’d be spending stuck at his desk.

 

Nine if Bob decided to come in with another last minute project, as he was prone to doing.

 

_You know who was an underrated genius?_

_Scott._

_If I would have just had the foresight to drop out of high school and sell drugs, I really could have saved myself a lot of grief_. _Why didn’t the guidance counselors ever do more to encourage good ideas like that?_

 

Across the street, the protesters sounded as enthusiastic as ever. Even across four lanes of honking traffic, he could hear them heckling passersby, and he dreaded having to make his way through that gauntlet yet again.

 

Taking a deep breath, he reminded himself that Bob would not be back for another hour, and that if he could just make it back to his office, he could easily spend the next thirty minutes texting with Larson about whether a velociraptor would be able to beat a tiger in a gladiator battle. The thought had come to him as he’d been waiting in line for his sandwich, and it seemed that if anyone would understand the merits of such a debate, it would be Larson.

 

Or perhaps Laura. But he was pretty sure he’d burned that bridge earlier. Adjusting his scarf, he made his way back through the crowd, silently cursing the fact that he couldn’t exactly walk any faster.

.

“Hey Duckfucker, how are the pros working out for you?”

 

He stopped and did a double take.

 

Getting heckled by protesters was hardly new—as a preppy white guy in a Brooks Brothers suit and expensive sunglasses, he tended to be one of their favorite targets, his stern expression and board straight posture giving him an added air of seniority. Normally, though, the insults were a bit less personal.

 

After all, as a concept, he made a great villain. As an actual person, he was the story Midwestern mothers thought of when they decided to sign their sons up for basketball, instead.

 

Squinting, he looked into the crowd, the midday sun making it hard to see where the voice had come from.

 

“You heard me, asshole.”

 

This time, there was no mistaking the voice or its source. Soon, Adam was face to face with the traitorous friend who had sent him headfirst into a goalpost so many years earlier.

 

Chuckling, he noted that Brian McGill had certainly grown since high school, but only horizontally, his extra extra large Che Guevara shirt straining at the gut.

 

“I would tell you to suck my dick, but from the looks of things, you’d try to eat it.”

 

“At least I can feel mine.”

 

“Yeah, well, I felt mine just fine when I fucking your mom last night. I hope we didn’t wake you, Bottle Boy.”

 

“Oh fuck you, asshole.” Brian responded, giving Adam a light shove.

 

In a rare moment of agility, Adam actually remained on his feet, swinging his cane into Brian’s knees once he’d regained his balance.

 

It was at that moment, as Brian’s steel colored eyes attempted to bore holes through his skin, that Adam remembered one crucial thing: He sucked at fighting. Fearsome though his reputation had been in his Hawk days, even in elementary school, his pugilistic prowess had left a bit to be desired, the aggressive forward relying on Brian to do his dirty work.

 

Suddenly, as Brian’s fist swung at his face, time seemed to slow down, and two decades of lost fights all played through his head; a Greatest Hits montage of getting pummeled.

.

There had been the time in first grade when he’d called Brian a dumbass, and Brian had responded by pinning him to the ground and farting in his mouth. There had been the embarrassing fallout with Larson in second grade over who got to be which ThunderCat, where Larson gave him a bloody nose and he started crying in front of the rest of the Hawks, which in turn made Larson cry, too. There had been the fight on the playground following his switch to the Ducks, which left him with a swollen eye and split lip. There had been the incidents with Varsity. There had been the fight with Rick Riley his senior year that had left him with nearly 100 stiches across his cheek and a lasting scar that he was still self-conscious about. There had been the assorted on-ice brawls, which, out of an attachment to both his teeth and his dignity, he’d generally done his best to avoid.

 

He’d held his own in a few fights, but on the whole, nobody was recommending that he take up boxing.

 

And that, of course, had all been back when he could feel his legs and use both of his hands. As Brian’s meaty knuckles connected with his jaw, it occurred to him that his ass kicking abilities probably hadn’t _improved_ since the night he left a permanent trail of blood across Tom Riley’s new travertine floor.

 

_Why couldn’t I have thought about this oh, say, forty seconds ago?_

 

 

 

 


	6. Chapter 6

December, 2001 

“You look very handsome.” Laura smiled, carefully straightening Adam’s tie and adjusting his collar, then stepping back to admire her handiwork.

 

As he sat in bed, his girlfriend having to help dress him, he didn’t feel handsome. He felt many things—helpless, pathetic, sad—but not handsome. The handsome ship had sailed right alongside the NHL ship and the ‘able to use a fork and knife without assistance’ ship, leaving him sitting alone at the dock watching the ships go by like _Forrest Gump’s_ Lieutenant Dan.

 

_At least Lieutenant Dan had a cigar…_

“I know.” She sighed, reaching forward to brush a lock of sandy hair out of his face. “I know.”

…………………………

A few moments later, a panting, red faced Brian was being held back by several protesters, his whole body jiggling in waves of fury as he strained against his fellow hippies. What the former Hawk lacked in strength, he made up for in size, leaving Adam with the distinct feeling that he’d just had his ass kicked by a patchouli scented Jabba the Hutt. The adrenaline having not yet worn off, the former hockey star felt ready for another round, save for the fact that he’d need someone to help him back up. As he lay helplessly in the dirt, blood flowing down his wind nipped cheeks, he found himself cursing the Wisconsin defenseman who’d doomed him to a perpetual Life Alert ad, the indignity every bit as soul crushing as the physical pain.  

 

_Fuck Wisconsin. Fuck them and their cheese curds._

Still, as he looked back at Brian, his ego started to recover. Blood was dripping from Brian’s lip down both chins, and a nasty black eye was already forming. Lifting his swollen hand, Adam carefully felt of his own face—everything below his nose was sticky with blood, and the top of his nose now zig zagged.

 

“Are you alright?”

 

Transfixed by Brian’s rolling waves of blubber, he hadn’t noticed the kind woman standing over him, long dreadlocks flowing down her shoulders. Carefully, she helped him to his feet, then reached down to retrieve his cane for him.

 

“Heh, yeah, I’m fine. Thank you so much.”

 

As he regained his footing, he took further stock of the situation. The adrenaline starting to wear off, he realized that his elbow was throbbing, and looking down, he saw that his shirt and suit jacket were torn. His beloved cashmere scarf was soaked in blood, and his Wayfarers were in pieces, the bridge having been smashed over the top of his nose. His entire face ached, and from the sharp pain in his jaw, he dreaded looking in the mirror.

 

Still, aside from his nose, everything seemed to be in place. As far as fights went, he’d survived worse.

 

“Good. Lets see about getting you inside and cleaned up.”

 

Together, he and the dreadlocked woman slowly made their way back to the gleaming tower where he worked, her dark, weathered hands ready to steady him if he needed it as the late October wind continued its relentless assault.

.

Standing there at entrance of the grand lobby, it dawned on both of them that they looked out of place amid the acres of immaculate marble and corporate beige, their very existence marring the façade of capitalistic perfection.  The woman next to him, confident mere seconds ago, suddenly became quieter, her commanding body shrinking back down to its 5”2 frame as they walked through the glass double doors together. Sensing her discomfort, Adam thanked her for her assistance and assured her that could make it back up to his office on his own, his blood dotting the spotless Carrara as he spoke.

 

“You’re certain that you’re alright?”

 

“Positive. I promise I’m tougher than I look.” He joked, a smile turning up through his cheeks. “Thank you so much, though.”

 

As he smiled, another burst of pain radiated out from his nose, and he briefly cursed the expressive face that Julie had once loved so much; the way that _everything_ moved he’d smile was not doing him any favors at the moment.

.

Defeated, he rested his forehead against the wall of the lobby, the coolness of a nearby Lucite sign a welcome relief for his pounding head. As blood continued to soak his scarf and pitter patter against the marble, he thought of the conversations lying ahead—there was no way Laura and Bob _weren’t_ going to find out what happened, and he half suspected that once Bob found out, he was _also_ going to get to explain his newfound unemployment to Laura.

 

_Hey sweetheart, you know how you always say I spend too much time at work…_

.

A second later, he was still lost in his own thoughts when he was startled by the ding of the elevator. Jerking back from his cool Lucite pillow, his eyes briefly met with Lindzee’s, the svelte wannabe cheerleader chattering with another secretary from compliance. Both women were in their usual painted on pencil skirts, the grey lycra blends leaving just enough to the imagination to distract Adam from his other concerns. As Lindzee slowly stepped off the elevator, thoughts of unemployment were nowhere to be found, replaced instead with fantasies of bouncing breasts and positions normally not seen outside of a kama sutra diagram, unfortunate physical limitations be damned.

 

_Oh the things I could do…_

“Eww!”

 

“Oh my gosh, seriously?”

 

“We so need to find better jobs!”

 

Giving Adam disgusted looks as they brushed past, the two giggled about what a sad bunch of losers they worked with, their stilettos click-clacking across the blood stained floor as they headed out to lunch themselves, carefully avoiding the puddles of crimson that formed a trail between the elevator and the outside doors.

 

Looking down at his bloodied scarf and the torn dress shirt that now exposed a bit of round tummy, he had no choice but to concede their point.

…………. 

December, 2001

 

Standing at center ice in the Mariucci Arena, Adam bit down on the inside of his cheek, his molars digging into the soft, spongy flesh. Looking up into the packed stands, he bit harder and harder, the warm trickle of blood in his mouth a welcome distraction from the flood of tears forming in his eyes.

 

Laura stood by his side in a winter white shift and pearls, surreptitiously helping steady him as his weakened legs threatened to send him crashing to the ice. With his cane in his good hand, and Laura on the other side, a mink clad arm around his waist, he slowly put one foot in front of the other as the crowd cheered.

.

From up in the stands, he looked solid. Steady. In his navy suit and burgundy wingtips, the old hockey jersey over his Brooks Brothers oxford, he looked, if not completely able bodied, at least like another strapping young WASP recovering from a skiing mishap or poorly executed balcony jump—like he would be able to go back to his old life in another month or two, having gained a wild story to tell at parties.

.

What couldn’t be seen from the stands was that Laura was helping hold him up; that the two had spent countless hours practicing this very thing in the living room of his handicap accessible apartment. That he had propped an old video camera up on his bookshelf, taping their trips across the chipped tile so that he could go back and analyze them, painstakingly picking apart the tiniest movements, determined to look as much as possible like the hockey star everyone had once loved, and not like the guy who now needed assistance to use the bathroom.

.

Breathing in the chilly air, the smell of popcorn and spent hockey players and Laura’s Chanel perfume all mixed together, he focused on each step, determined not to let the tears in his eyes well over.

 

 _“Be a man. Be a man. Be a man_.” He repeated to himself, Laura pulling him in closer as his knee started to give.

 

An ironic side effect of all of the self-conscious practice, his naturally awkward gait was now erased. His posture was straighter; his slow, careful steps more even. For the first time since hitting puberty, he knew what to do with his shoulders, and as he neared the podium, he looked as patrician as ever, his eyes locked on the massive replica of his old jersey. In front of him, the maroon and gold ‘99’ towered over him, a reminder of all that he would never again be.

 

“I can’t thank you all enough…” He began, his soft, unwavering voice piercing the silent stadium. With every word, he felt as though he had a tennis ball stuck in his throat, but on he continued until the replica of his jersey had been raised up into the rafters.

 

Ten thousand fans let their tears fall, stoic Lutheran men dabbing at their eyes with the sleeves of their maroon sweatshirts as they thought of all that could have been. Still, Adam himself never faltered, maintaining his flawless façade until every hand had been shaken and every picture posed for.

 

Later, he would fall apart. Back in the privacy of his dreary first floor apartment, that he would drink until it was okay to cry, smashing bottles of gin and old trophies as Laura kindly pretended to be asleep.

 

For now, though, in the middle of the Mariucci arena, he was as perfect as ever.


	7. Chapter 7

A short time later, Adam was back in his office, staring mindlessly at the artificial Ficus tree in the corner. A few minutes earlier, a very concerned Carol had been kind enough to hunt down an ice pack and clean up the worst of the blood, leaving him with gauze up his nose, a bandaged elbow, and a massive Ziploc bag of ice over his face. Now, the challenge was figuring out how to hold said bag of ice over his nose while keeping a hand free to type—a bit of a problem considering that his right arm served little purpose aside from filling out shirt sleeves and bumping into breakable things at inopportune times.

 

 _“God I wish I were an octopus. If I were an octopus, I’d still have four useful hands left.”_ He thought wistfully, briefly imagining a life under the sea with four useful appendages, no bills, and the ability to shoot ink at the at the aquatic Brians and Bobs of the world.

Sighing in frustration, he set the bulging Ziploc down on his desk and reached into a drawer for his usual solution to such problems—Purdue Pharma had yet to make paralyzed limbs move or give him enough money to afford the life he wanted, but they _had_ done a nice job of making his shitty problems feel a little less shitty, and short of becoming an octopus, that seemed the best he could hope for.

 

Catching a glimpse of his torn, bloodied shirt in the process, he decided that the situation called for an extra dose of opioid happiness, if only to bring him a step closer to forgetting about the sight in front of him.

.

Already, he was well aware that real life was not an action movie, and he was _not_ Sylvester Stallone—the fact that he would forever have access to all of the good parking spaces was a pretty constant reminder of that fact. Still, looking at his oxford that was torn in all of the wrong places, it seemed that the universe was working overtime to drive that point home, his dignity in more pieces than his broken sunglasses.

.

In the movies, whenever a character’s clothes were torn in a fight, they would reveal tanned, rippling muscles underneath, the sweat glistening in the light of the explosions nearby. In _this_ case, however, there were no tanned, rippling muscles, nor any climactic explosions. Just two generous rolls of pasty blubber, highlighted by the florescent light buzzing softly overhead.

 

_Why did I ever take functioning abdominal muscles for granted?_

 

Swallowing a couple of pills, he sat back in his chair for a moment, once again contemplating the inevitable call to Laura that he was going to have to make if he wanted a break from staring at his own exposed fat rolls for the next seven hours. In the background, he could hear Bob shouting at his co-worker Chad from across the hall, the familiar refrain of “fucking cocksucking faggot” and “dumbass fucking retard” echoing through most of the ninth floor.

 

Shutting his heavy eyelids, his mind started to drift off when the usual symphony of obscenity was interrupted by the buzz of his iPhone vibrating against his desk. Jerked out of his stupor, he stared down at the cracked screen, a thousand feelings all rushing to the surface.

 

 _Dr. Kitty_.

 

For a moment, he just let the phone vibrate, unsure of what to do as seventeen years of memories flooded his weary, prescription-addled mind. At once, he was 13, and feeling things he’d never felt before as he watched a goalie with the most gorgeous green eyes skate out onto the ice. He was 15, and even through the haze of Morphine and a fractured skull, he could see a long blonde ponytail hanging over the edge of a cot next to his hospital bed. He could still feel her warm, naked body against his the summer before his junior year, and the way that a lifetime of inadequacy all seemed to melt away as she gently nibbled at his neck. He could feel his heart racing as his date to junior prom slowly walked down the dormitory stairs, her shimmering white dress hugging her every curve, and he could hear the words of Edwin McCain’s _I’ll Be_ playing in the background as he held her tightly on the dance floor, still amazed by his good fortune.    

 

He could also see all of the moments she _wasn’t_ there for. The four minute ride back home after a run-in with Rick Riley in the Varsity locker room, his hands still shaking as his mom fiddled with the seat warmer, oblivious as to what had happened to her son. Oblivious to the fact that he would still wake up with nightmares about that afternoon for decades to come. He could see that first hockey practice as a college freshman, where he looked around and felt like a toddler surrounded by hulking beasts, and all of those months in the hospital, when he didn’t know if he’d be able to brush his own teeth or comb his own hair again. He could feel that afternoon in the Mariucci arena; and that night when he downed a fifth of Bombay Sapphire and cried himself to sleep in a closet, clutching onto Mr. Fluffy as it fully sank in how much he’d lost.

 

“Hello?” He answered, his speech garbled from the wad of bloody gauze up his nose.

 

“Adam! Are you alright?”

 

From a thousand miles away, her concern was still unmistakable. He had no idea what he’d done to cause such worry, but he couldn’t help but feel guilty.

 

“Uh, I think so? Any particular reason you’re asking?”

 

“Well, my favorite preppy, there’s this little thing called the internet…”

 

 _So many possibilities, and yet none of them good_.

“I’m really not going to go into why fighting is a bad idea, particularly for someone with three fused vertebrae, because really, you took physics in high school, so you should probably be able to figure that one out.”

 

Julie paused for a moment, letting the obviousness of her statement sink in. “But more than that, that behavior was appalling. The Adam I knew would have never acted like that.”

 

 _Yeah, well, apparently you never cared that much about him, anyway_.

 

“Oh come on Julie, it was Brian McGill! I _absolutely_ would have done the same thing fifteen years ago.”

 

“Okay, first of all, sixteen year old you didn’t look like a washed up heroin junkie. And secondly, most people continue to mature past high school—getting in fights during hockey games is a pretty normal thing _when you’re 16_. Getting into fights on your way into work is not so normal, especially not when you’re a grown adult!”

 

“Yeah, well, I’m glad to see you’re as self-righteous as ever.”

 

Julie sighed, trying to think of the right words. Meanwhile, Adam leaned back in his desk chair, once again starting to nod off, courtesy of both the OxyContin and his perpetual sleep deprivation.

 

“I didn’t say that to be hurtful. Believe it or not, I care about you. A lot. You’re one of my best friends…”

 

Heavy eyelids and all, those words were enough to cut through the fog. No matter how mixed his feelings for her were, her opinion still mattered more than most.

 

“I’m sorry, Jules. You’re one of my best friends, too.”

 

“Thank you. And on a serious note, are you sure you’re okay? It looked like you took some pretty hard hits—“

 

“Come on now, don’t you remember that I’m invincible?”

 

“How could I forget?”

 

“Exactly! I think we’re worried about the wrong person here.”

 

“Oh yeah. Well clearly we can check confusion and loss of memory off the list.” She laughed, relieved that the conversation had turned back the cliff it was headed down. “But really. Any dizziness? Nausea? Changes in consciousness?”

 

“Don’t worry.” He smiled, sitting forward again. “I have just as many brain cells now as I did when I woke up this morning. I counted—they’re all four there.”

 

“Well, now I know you miscounted, because that’s at least one more than what you started with!”

 

“Hey there, _Dr. Kitty_. Don’t forget which one of us it was that got into Harvard.”

 

“Yeah, and it’s the one of us who _didn’t_ go to an Ivy League, _Cake eater_.”

 

“Aww man, the claws are as sharp as ever.”

 

“Really, though.” He softly reassured her a second later, their playful banter having petered off. “I’m fine. But thank you for taking the time to check in on me.”

 

“Of course, Adam. I love you. I love you more than you’ll ever know.”

 

“Thank you. I love you too, Julie.”

* * *

 

February, 2002

 

Pulling into the parking lot of the Edina Galleria, Adam sat back against the black leather for a moment, taking a deep breath.

 

Relatively speaking, the single story Galleria was a tiny mall, dwarfed even by Southdale across the street. A year earlier, he would have thought nothing of running in there to pick up a new pair of loafers at Cole Haan, or a shirt at Brooks Brothers, no store more than a two minute walk from the entrance.

 

The difference was, that was last year.

 

Now, every step was a struggle. As he looked over at the endless expanse of windowless brown brick, he found himself cursing Victor Gruen and the behemoth buildings the architect had pioneered, the white marble corridors now far more daunting than they once had been. Mentally, he calculated the distance to Tiffany & Co., wishing the shopping center offered Sherpa services.

 

He had too much pride for his wheelchair, but a nice Himalayan to carry him through the mall seemed a dignified enough option. Particularly at a place like The Galleria, such a service would speak more of one’s disposable income than physical infirmity, and he saw no real downsides to being carried straight into Tiffany’s, perhaps with a nice glass of scotch in hand.

 

As an added bonus, the glass of scotch would go a long way towards calming his nerves…something he needed all the help with that he could get.

 

_I probably should have asked her if she preferred white gold or yellow._

Opening the door, he reached over to the passenger side of his Porsche and grabbed the shining metal stick that had become an unfortunate fixture in his life, setting the tip of the forearm crutch down on the concrete below. Carefully, he got out of the car, at one point steadying himself against the door frame to keep his balance. Placing one foot in front of the other, he slowly made his way through the drab parking lot, at one point stopping to double check that he had his wallet and Am Ex in the back pocket of his khakis.

.

His mind now focused on each uneasy step, he couldn’t help but concede that this was one instance where his damaged spinal cord wasn’t an altogether bad thing –normally, having to put so much thought into every movement was a source of sadness, but in this case, it was a nice distraction from the thoughts that had been swirling through his mind during the entire half hour drive over. Several times, he’d started to chicken out, tempted to turn back around and go home.

 

 _Saying_ he wanted to marry Laura was one thing. Buying the ring was another.

 

 _“It’s not like you have much choice_ …” He thought as he neared the Robin’s Egg blue entrance.

 

And, of course, in many ways, he didn’t.

* * *

 

Looking down at his phone, the picture saved as his lock screen burned itself into his mind—he and the two boys the winter before, standing next to a massive snowman they’d built together, their cheeks ruddy and wind nipped from a full day out in the December blizzard.

 

For reasons that could only make sense in the mind of a four year old, Tucker had decided to name their snowman Tyrannosaurus Pepsi, and the round Tyrannosaurus Pepsi stood nearly as tall as Adam, dressed in a polka dot bowtie and sunglasses. In the picture, Tucker and Will proudly stood beside their dad as the late afternoon sun set behind the four of them, Tyrannosaurus Pepsi’s outfit helping him to fit in nicely with the rest of the stylish, preppy family.    

.

Building a 6 ft. tall snowman hadn’t been an easy task, particularly for someone in Adam’s condition. The project took an entire Saturday, and his battered body made him pay dearly; he ended up spending the next three days curled up in bed with a heating pad, a bottle of OxyContin, and a glass of Johnny Walker, in far too much pain to even think of moving.

 

Still, it had been worth it. For a few glorious hours, he’d gotten to feel like a _real_ father—the kind of father who wore LL Bean and did fun things with his kids and made lame jokes on the way to hockey practice. The kind of father he’d always dreamed he’d be back when he was younger, hiding under the covers as he listened to his own father in the next room over, berating Scott for the latest C on his report card or his wrinkled khakis.

.

Sliding his thumb across the screen to unlock the phone, he pulled up Laura’s number. Sitting there at his desk, he contemplated what he would say—how he’d apologize. How he’d explain why he needed a fresh change of clothes. How he’d once again try to make her forgive him for all of the things he’d done wrong—a list that tended to gain 60 or 70 pages on a _good_ day.

.

He tapped his foot nervously as he listened to the dial tone.

 

_Ring_

 

No answer.

 

_Ring_

 

No answer

 

_Ring_

 

“Hello?”

 

“Hey sweetheart. How are you?”

 

“I’m okay. And you?”

 

“I’m fine.”

 

As he answered, it dawned on him that he _definitely_ did not sound fine; the gauze shoved up his nose making him sound a bit like chipmunk with a sinus infection.

 

“Uh huh. And what’s your bad news?”

 

 _I really should have picked dumber women_.

 

“Oh come on now! I could be calling with all kinds of good news! How do you know I didn’t just win the lottery or something?”

 

“Alright, fine. What’s your good news?”

 

“Well, I don’t actually have any.” He admitted. “But I _could_ have.”

 

“Well, yeah, I suppose anything is possible. What’s your _not_ good news?”

 

“It’s not _bad_ news.”

 

He paused for a moment, thinking about how he wanted to proceed with breaking the obviously bad news.

 

In his imagination, he could see her standing in the kitchen, her light eyebrows furrowed in concern. She would be drumming her fingers against the granite countertop, nervously chewing the right side of her bottom lip as she awaited the inevitable.

 

“Or, I mean, it’s kind of bad news, don’t get me wrong, but it’s not like, _bad_ bad news.”

 

He took his sweet time, knowing from experience that time was on his side. The longer he spent making her sweat, the worse the possibilities running through her head would be, and as such, the more relieved she’d be when he finally told her what really happened.

 

“The last time you said that, you burned our kitchen down.”

 

_Yup. That’s exactly the type of reference point I was hoping for._

 

“Well exactly! Did I burn the whole house down? No. Did anyone die? No. All that happened was that our insurance went up a bit and I spent a few weeks with singed eyebrows and a blistered nose.”

 

“You know,” She laughed, a bit of the usual levity returning to her voice, “If you could just take that optimistic of an approach to everyone _else’s_ shortcomings, I’m pretty sure both of our lives would be about 1000% happier.”

 

“Well, come on now. I can’t very well let you die of happiness, now can I? I mean, who would fix my tie for me _then_?”

 

“You’re so selfless…”

 

“I try.”

 

“Okay, well as long as we’re on the same page.” She smiled. “So what’s your bad, but not ‘bad bad’ news this time? I’m standing in the kitchen right now, so I know it’s not that. But do you still have eyebrows?”

 

“Yes I do!”

 

“Good.”

 

“But I do need a fresh change of clothes.”

 

“Okay…”

 

“And my nose is probably broken.”

 

“Alright.”

 

“And by ‘probably’, I mean definitely.”

 

“I assumed that much.”

 

“And I’m hoping I don’t get fired.”

 

“Anything else?”

 

“No, that pretty much sums it up.”

 

“Oh. Okay. Well, I‘m glad to hear that you don’t have any ‘ _bad_ bad’ news.”

* * *

February, 2002

 

Two hours and $24,000 later, Adam was back at his soulless first floor apartment, staring at the little blue box.

 

It wasn’t that he didn’t still love Laura.

 

He loved her every bit as much as he had a year and a half earlier. Perhaps more so.

 

It’s just that is was a different kind of love now.

 

The rich, separate, _interesting_ lives they’d both once enjoyed had been brought to an end by the eight months of hospitals and rehabs. By the unpleasant realities that followed—of her having to help with catheters and trips to the bathroom and cutting steaks and buttoning shirts. The line between girlfriend and caretaker, love and obligation and practical neccessity; the very definitions of where she ended and he began had all been hopelessly blurred.

 

No sparkling platinum ring or internship at an investment bank downtown would ever be able to give them back the type of relationship they’d had before.

 

Pouring himself a drink, he sat back against the striped club chair and looked around.

.

Gone were the framed hockey jerseys, and shelves full of old trophies. Gone was his view of the city’s skyline off in the distance. Gone was the old hockey stick he’d used in that final game against Iceland, and the picture of he and Julie after the national championship game their senior year, and the slightly tattered North Stars blanket he’d been holding onto since he was four. Most of those things had been destroyed in the various fits of rage, and those that hadn’t had all just finally been thrown away, the reminders of his old life all too much to bear as he now struggled with doors and uneven sidewalks.

 

After he threw everything out, Laura did her best to create a happy new space for him, complete with well stocked book shelves and nice pewter frames on the end tables and chinoiserie vases filled with perfectly arranged flowers. There was nice art filling the taupe walls, and she’d found a wonderful overstuffed club chair that gave him a modicum of relief from the constant physical pain.

 

Still, it had all been for naught. The passion that had once filled his life was gone, replaced handrails in the bathroom and a first floor view of a parking lot. No chinoiserie vase or abstract painting would ever be able to fix that, anymore than a little blue box would ever allow him to be the kind of husband he’d once dreamed of being.

 

As he glanced over at the pewter frame on the end table nearby, he studied the photo taken a little over a year earlier, of him jokingly carrying Laura upside down over his back, her mouth wide open with laughter as he jogged across a leafy section of campus. Both in boat shoes and khaki chino shorts, both freshly tanned from a spring break getaway to the Cayman Islands, they appeared a decade younger, their sparkling eyes blissfully unaware of what was to come a week later.  

 

Looking back down at the blue box in his lap, he wished more than anything that _that_ Adam could propose to _that_ Laura.


	8. Chapter 8

February, 2002

 

Standing in front of the hotel mirror, Adam checked his reflection one more time: It wasn’t what he wanted it to be, his nose _still_ too large, his skin _still_ too pale.

 

In addition to the insecurities that he’d been dealing with his whole life, there were also the Frankenstein-esque scars from the halo, which became visible any time he forgot and ran his fingers though his hair. There were the various false and capped teeth along the front of his mouth that, skilled though the cosmetic dentist had been, never looked quite right to him. There was the general awkwardness of being a 20 year old guy who now needed a crutch and leg brace to walk; the uncomfortable moments when someone would start to shake hands, not noticing that nothing below his right shoulder could move.

 

Still, as he fixed the collar of his button down and adjusted his cashmere scarf, he felt pretty good about things. He’d never again be the hockey star Julie had fallen in love with, but he was still a decent looking guy. A decent looking guy with a decent future ahead of him, complete with a modest trust fund and an upcoming internship at Goldman Sachs.

 

 _“You’ve still got it.”_ He reminded himself, smiling at his reflection before he turned towards the door.

 

 _You’re still the same guy you always were_ …

.

Limping through the marble lobby and out towards the rented Toyota in the parking lot, a part of him found himself hoping that those good qualities would be enough to win back a certain goalie. That Julie would be able to see all of the things that he _could_ still do, rather than all of the things that he couldn’t.

 

As he pulled his coat in tighter, he reminded himself of the job offers and nights of beer pong with his friends, doing his best to forget that he’d needed help getting into the shower an hour earlier.

 

“You okay, dude?” Scott asked, looking over with concern.

 

“Nah, not really.” Adam admitted, the last ten months having led to more candor than usual.

 

“Meh, I fry cheese curds for a living, and I still get laid. You should be good.”

 

“I’m not trying to get laid, dumbass.”

 

“Sure.”

 

“I’m _engaged_. To _Laura_.”

 

“Exactly!” Scott laughed, reaching for the flask in his coat pocket. “If Julie rode your trouser snake, I’m pretty sure Laura would write her a thank you note.”

 

“Of course. She writes thank you notes for everything.”

 

“Dear Julie, thank you for giving short dong schlong some much needed love and attention. Your thirty seconds of sacrifice gave me a little extra time to adjust my pearls and practice my napkin folding. I know it couldn’t have been pleasant, but—“

 

“Fuck you”

 

“Nah, that’s what you’re hoping Julie will do!”

 

“Am not!”

 

“Am too!”

 

“Am not!”

 

“You know you’re wanting to pet the pussy cat…”

 

Adam shook his head laughing before reaching over to take a pull from Scott’s flask of Jim Beam.

 

“It’s really a shame Mom drank so much while she was pregnant.”

 

“I know. Look at you.”

 

“Abortion survivor”

 

“Christopher Reeve”

 

The banter continued, the harsh mountain wind nipping at their faces as the jokes grew even less appropriate. The whole time, Adam reminded himself that he had a very nice fiancé back home, and that the only reason he had flown out to Utah was _congratulate_ Julie.

 

As a friend.

.

It was just a coincidence that he’d brought Scott along rather than Laura.

 

Totally just a coincidence that definitely did not have anything at all to do with his feelings for a certain Olympic goalie, nor with Laura’s affinity for Lanz of Salzburg nightgowns and talking about toile.

* * *

 

 

Forcing himself back to productivity, Adam refreshed his email and set to work doing the same thing he’d been doing for the last three and half years: Lying.

 

His face and elbow throbbing, he sent one carefully worded email after another assuring investors that things would turn around. That everything would be okay.

 

The whole time, as the florescent lights of his office gently buzzed, he calculated just how underwater he and Laura were on their 2,700 sq. foot house; a house in the middle of a subdivision that now sat half empty with foreclosures and partially poured slabs that never had a chance to become McMansions.

 

From the veranda outside Laura’s bedroom, a person could see all of the razed lots. All of the bare rebar being overtaken by weeds as developers realized that there was no use finishing houses that nobody would purchase.

 

He thought of his own retirement savings that had been wiped out by the recession, and about how his health was unlikely to hold up well enough for him to work past middle age. He thought about how private school tuition was apparently the one thing that had _not_ been impacted by the economy, and about how he was soon going to have to come up with another $29,000 a year to send Will to Breck.

 

He thought about his aging car, and the AmEx bill sitting on the breakfast table back home, and the cost of hockey camps and Neiman Marcus sweaters and insurance copays and vodka and Viking appliances.

 

His wrist picking that of all moments to start aching again, he looked down and shook his head.

 

 _Damn fucking Vikings_.

  

* * *

 

 

February, 2002

 

 

“It uh, it looks like you’re doing well. Really—really well.” Julie politely smiled, nodding as she talked, as if to try to convince _herself_ of what she was saying. “Much uh, much better than last time…”

 

Sitting three feet away, Adam’s first love was as gorgeous as ever, her honey blonde hair flowing past her shoulders and an emerald shift dress bringing out her eyes. The dimly lit restaurant only made her more beautiful, the flickering candlelight casting her fair skin in a golden glow.

 

More than anything, he wanted to tell her he loved her. He wanted to reach across the table and hold her delicate hand; perhaps whisper some naughty things in her ear and take her back to his hotel room to relive some of his finest adolescent memories.

 

Unfortunately, as he watched those shimmering green eyes awkwardly glance back and forth between the linen tablecloth and the arm that hung uselessly at his side, he knew those things would never happen. With every “uh” and “umm”, he could feel his heart breaking into ever smaller pieces, the disfluency speaking volumes about how unwanted he was.

.

No longer was he a guy with impeccable manners and a delightful smile; the one boy who had been able to make her heart flutter since junior high. The bouquet of hydrangeas he’d dropped off at the restaurant several hours earlier, and he way that he’d still managed to get the door for her, and the upcoming job offers were all irrelevant.

 

No matter what he did or how hard he tried, ultimately, he was an unwanted reminder of life’s uncertainty. One hundred and ninety pounds of proof that no amount that no amount of planning or conscientiousness could shield one from tragedy.

 

Try as she might, the right words were just nowhere to be found, her mind still struggling to process that the events of the past year had happened. That there was never going to be a magical re-set button, giving him back the life he was _supposed_ to have.        

.

“I’m uh…I’m really happy for you. It umm, it really sounds like things are going well…”

 

_Uh huh. Especially right now. So well I could just jump off a fucking cliff with happiness._

“They really are. You know, all things considered.” He nodded, taking another bite of salad. “Mostly though, I’m just proud of you, Cat Lady.”

 

At that, Julie’s cheeks flushed bright pink…a fact that he was now too busy staring down at the vase of carefully arranged laurel and hydrangeas to notice.

 

“I’m proud of you, too, you know.” She reminded him, her face still a bright shade of magenta.

 

If he would have been paying attention, he would have noticed that she didn’t stumble over _those_ words. That she wasn’t looking at the tablecloth, or his useless arm, or the scars that weren’t quite covered by his sandy bangs. She was looking at _him_ , her first love in all of his polite, cashmere clad glory.

 

Unfortunately, by that time, he wasn’t paying attention. He was off in his own world, too busy adding her love to the mental tally of things he would never again experience.

_She has the Dartmouth and the Olympics. I have the ability to put on my own pants._

_Sometimes_.

 

 _On a good day_.

 

* * *

 

“ _Dear Dr. Wentworth…_ ” He began to type to one particularly agitated client.

 

_I understand that, based on the present performance of your portfolio, you have some concerns about the security of your investments._

_Considering that this email is being written by a guy who can’t afford name brand Velveeta, you are absolutely correct to be concerned. Objectively speaking, you are completely fucked._

_The irony, of course, being that in light of your current net worth, there probably won’t be much ACTUAL fucking in your future._

_Warmest regards,_

_Adam W. T. Banks_

* * *

 

May, 2002

 

“Bitches ain’t shit but hoes and tricks—“ Adam and his pledge brother Chip rapped, the two of them drunkenly swaying back and forth atop a walnut coffee table in the Sigma Chi living room. “Lick on these nuts and suck the dick.”

 

In the background, the base of the stereo thumped, a room full of partygoers watching as the spectacle unfolded with a mix of horror and amusement.

.

Under the best of circumstances, they neither one possessed much rhythm.

 

As the two unsteadily wobbled in their Ralph Lauren khakis and pastel button downs, it was clear that inebriation had not helped the situation. Both having decided that cocaine, OxyContin, and bourbon would be a wise pairing, they were now shouting the lyrics, their eyes glassed over and their hair matted with sweat. With each verse, their sense of rhythm seemed to decline further, until the already vulgar lyrics devolved into incoherent yelling, the original song completely drowned out by the frat boy rendition.

 

“Gets the fuck out after you’re done—“

 

The mountain of drugs he’d done over the night removing even the most sensible of inhibitions, Adam proceeded to take off his shirt, flinging the neat candystripe button down across the room.

.

Sober, he was too self-conscious to remove his clothes during sex; his already fragile confidence further destroyed by a body that no longer fit conventional standards of attractiveness.

 

Thanks to his new friend cocaine, however, he felt great. As dopamine flooded his brain, he was no longer a 21 year old who struggled with buttons and forks, but rather, everything he’d ever wished he could be. As he continued to unsteadily sway atop the coffee table, holding onto Chip for balance, he pictured himself as Scott, before Scott became _Scott_.

 

Twenty feet away, meanwhile, Laura looked on in horror.

.

“Adam.” She said calmly, approaching the makeshift stage. “Sweetheart, I think it’s time to go home.”

 

Completely oblivious to her, the performance continued on, uninterrupted.

 

“Bitches on my nuts like clothes—but I’m from Edina, and we don’t love them hoes—“

 

“Adam!” She repeated louder this time, refusing to let her Stepford smile falter, “Get down from there. We’re going home.”

 

“How cou—“

 

Suddenly, the performance was interrupted not by Laura’s admonishment, but by his old nemesis gravity. As his knee buckled out from under him, he face planted to the floor, landing with a thud against a faux Persian rug.

 

“Okay, lets get you hom—“ Laura began, kneeling down to examine whether he was injured.

 

Blood was trickling down his bottom lip, and from up close, it was more apparent than ever just how glazed over his eyes were; his massive pupils all but dead to the world around him.

 

“No. Fuck you.”

 

“What?”

 

“I said ‘fuck you’.”

 

“I knew _what_ you said, jackass.” She sighed, reaching for his crutch. “Now lets get up and go home.”

 

“I’m not going anywhere.”

 

“Fine. Stay here, then. I’m going home.”

 

“Bitch”


	9. Chapter 9

May, 2002

 

“I’m sorry. Really.”

 

Outside the room, he could hear nurses scurrying around, tending to people with problems far bigger than his. Meanwhile, inside, there was nowhere to hide from Laura’s disapproving gaze, her eyes glancing back and forth between his blood caked hair and his contrite smile.

 

With every painful breath, he found himself wishing that the Porsche’s airbag _hadn’t_ impeded his flight through the windshield, a quick death surely preferable to the disaster in front of him.

 

“Adam, it’s not that I’m mad. It’s that I’m worried.”

 

_Nope. I’ve seen worried. This isn’t it._

 

“The doctor said I’ll be fine.” He assured her, a slight slur to his speech. Reaching up to brush his bangs out of his eyes, he grimaced as his fingers brushed against the row of staples running across the top of his forehead. “I mean, breathing sucks right now, and I’ll probably end up with a pretty ridiculous scar along my hairline, but that’ll all be covered by my bangs, anyway.”

 

“Quit being obtuse.”

 

_Who even says that?_

_Gosh, I really do pick nerds…_

 

“I’m not obtuse.” He smiled, still determined to charm his way out of the doghouse. “I’m pretty skinny, actually. I’m an acute guy, if you will.”

 

From the look on Laura’s face, it was clear that his charm had fallen flat.

 

 _“Should have come up with a better joke_.” He cursed to himself, still pretty proud of his efforts.

 

After all, for a guy with a concussion and bruised sternum, he thought it was a solid pun.

……

Twenty minutes after his musical performance at the Sigma Chi house, it had dawned on him that Laura was not coming back for the night. She had, apparently, _meant it_ when she’d said that she was going home.

 

Still rather inebriated, he responded in what, at the time, seemed like a very romantic gesture: He downed the last of his bourbon, got in his car, and drove through Minneapolis in search of her, desperate to reassert his love. Several friends had tried to stop him, but it was to no avail; he was a _man on a mission_.

 

His mission came to an end ten minutes later, when he took out a dozen parked cars and woke up in the back of an ambulance, a paramedic shining a light into his pupils to check for signs of brain injury.

.

By that time, it was pretty obvious that his mission hadn’t proved quite the romantic gesture he’d intended. Still, in his mind, it was the thought that counted.

 

Besides, he hadn’t done anything _that_ bad.

 

_One time Dad clipped a pedestrian on our way to church, and Mom never said a word about it._

_Of course, it’s not like Mom was sober enough to notice…_

* * *

 

“You can’t do that.“

 

“Look, I made every payment on time for twelve years…”

 

Through the thin taupe walls, Adam could hear his co-worker John on the phone with an account rep at Wells Fargo, discussing the foreclosure on John’s four bedroom St. Louis Park colonial.

 

“I’m not asking for much. Just…give me another month to get caught u—“

 

“No, you listen”

.

For the past month, it had been an ongoing saga, each day taking a different tone. The day before, John had been crying. A week before that, he could be heard through the entire ninth floor threatening to kill the “fucking asslicking dick boy” at the other end of the line. Another day yet, he’d tried bribing the account rep with his $200 Bulova watch and a fruit basket.

 

On one hand, it was almost amusing, if only because John _was_ the kind of person to try to bribe someone with a used Bulova and fruit basket.

 

On the other hand, an eerily similar saga had been playing out down the hall after Dave’s wife of sixteen years took off to Toledo with their three kids.

 

 _That_ saga ultimately ended in a Burger King parking lot, where Dave blew his head off with a .44. Bits of the middle aged banker who insisted on referring to everyone as “broski” or “champ” ended up splattered across the leather interior of a Tahoe…a Tahoe that, perhaps not coincidentally, was on the verge of being repossessed.

.

“Sto—“

 

“No”

 

“Okay. You know what? Go to hell.”

 

“Oh shut—“

 

“Suck my dick”

 

.

Turning his attention back to the task at hand, Adam deleted the email he’d composed for Dr. Wentworth, replacing it instead with a copy and paste special that rambled on for seven mind numbing paragraphs about ‘market volatility’ and ‘industry averages’; the sheer length enough to put a meth cook to sleep.

 

Meanwhile, as he stared at the glowing screen in front of him, he did his best not to think about Dave. Not to think about their shared karaoke performance to ‘Purple Rain’ at the company Christmas party several years earlier, or the eight year old who’d come up to him at the corporate picnic back in May, wanting to talk about hockey and dinosaurs.

 

The eight year old who now lived in Toledo.

* * *

 

April, 2003

 

As Charlie keyed in the eight digit code outside the gates of Lakeview Pointe, he tried to brush away his second thoughts.

 

_Apartments, Charlie. These are apartments._

Still, as he eyed the 20 ft. marble fountain just past the entrance, surrounded by rolling fairways, it was hard to brush away his insecurities. The _Lakeview Pointe Estates of Edina_ were apartments in name only, known for housing bland yuppies and recent upper class divorcees too depressed to be bothered with maintaining their former mansions.   Iron gates with guards surrounded the 143-acre affront to logic, fortressing rich, lonely suburbanites off only from _other_ rich, lonely suburbanites.  

 

 _“How appropriate.”_ Charlie mused, thinking of the friend on the other side the gates.

 

Driving past the fountain and the white neoclassical clubhouse, past a row of spotless tennis courts and a glistening gunite pool, past yet _another_ manmade lake, he turned left down Augusta Cove before arriving at Building G, an elegant white columned unit that was doing it’s very best to hide the fact that it was, perish the indignity, an _apartment building_.

 

Finding a parking space between a Jaguar and a silver 3-Series, Charlie took a deep breath before getting out of his old Explorer.

 

 _Come on. This is for your friend_.

 

Getting out, he slowly walked over to apartment 102, taking another deep breath to steel his nerves before knocking on the door. It had always seemed a cruel irony that of all of his friends, the one who was the hardest to talk to perpetually lived in the kinds of places that only made conversation even _more_ uncomfortable.

 

Still, at least if the rumors were to be believed, it was a conversation that needed to be had.

 

_This isn’t going to be that bad. It might just all be talk, anyway…I mean, he looked fine when I ran into him in the library last week. People say things all the ti—_

 

“Uh, hi Charlie?”

 

 _Fuck me_.

 

On the other side of the doorway stood the sometimes friend/sometimes rival Charlie had known since he was seven, looking down at him quizzically through sleep encrusted eyes.

 

Standing there in just a pair of monogrammed boxers and a T-shirt, Charlie could no longer deny that the rumors were true. _This_ Adam, the one with uncombed hair and a gaping black hole where his teeth were supposed to be, had little in common with the neatly groomed preppy he’d seen just a few days earlier. Little in common with the determined forward he’d known for fourteen years; the one who’d once set a Hawks scoring record with a broken thumb, and who wore perfectly ironed clothes to the gym.

 

“Hey Adam. Mind if I uh, come inside?”

 

“Yeah, sure. Sorry.”

 

Gesturing over to the down-filled sofa, Adam invited Charlie to sit before hobbling back to his bedroom to get dressed.

 

“You know, there’s like, beer and stuff in refrigerator. Go ahead and make yourself at home, I’ll be out in a second.”

 

 _It’s two in the afternoon_.

 

Looking around, Charlie could hardly decide _what_ to feel, surrounded by gleaming marble and perfectly arranged orchids contrasted against a coffee table full of open pill bottles and half finished cigarettes. Staring down at the cut pieces of a neon pink straw sitting on an end table, he did his best to think of what to say as his old friend changed clothes in the other room, no words sounding quite right.

 

Planning his words had always been more Adam’s thing than Charlie’s, and leaning back against the slipcovered sofa, the more impulsive brunette found himself wishing he had a bit more practice _thinking_ about his words before they came out.

 

“Oh, and if you want to mix yourself a drink, liquor is in the first cabinet on the left. Glasses are in the second. Laura’s been busy with finals, so I don’t know if we have any like, food or anything.”

 

Desperate to shut off his thoughts, Charlie grabbed the remote off the end table and got up to open the television armoire, certain that whatever the mid-afternoon programming options were, they’d surely beat the things that were running through his head.

 

 _“Or not.”_ He conceded as he looked through the menu and realized his options consisted of Jerry Springer, Maury, or Women’s Bowling.

.

A few minutes later, Adam emerged from the bedroom a bit more presentable, now featuring combed hair and teeth. The khakis and polo were no different than Charlie remembered, but in the full context, it was clear that things weren’t the same.

 

A person was more than the sum of their parts, and in this case, a sleepy smile and tidy clothes couldn’t hide the fact that his old friend was gone.

 

“So dude, you got a moment to talk?”

 

“Sure.” Adam shrugged, carefully making his way to the kitchen. “Want a drink?”

 

Charlie shook his head no as Adam reached for a bottle of gin and poured a generous helping into his glass.

 

“Actually, that’s…kind of what I want to talk about.”

 

 _God I sound lame_.    

 

“What? Gin?”

 

“Yeah. I mean, no. I mean, crap, I don’t know. I’ve just, I’ve been hearing stuff.”

 

“Well congratulations,” Adam smiled, adding a few cubes of ice to his drink. “I’m always glad to know you’re not deaf. I mean, I don’t think I can use my hands well enough for sign language…”

 

“I’m serious.” Charlie sighed. “A lot of people…a lot of people are saying you’ve got a problem.”

 

“No shit, I’ve got more problems than Jay-Z.”

 

Looking down, Adam shrugged as he realized that he’d spilled a bit of tonic water on his polo. “Like that. Fuck. That’s got to bring the problem tally up to 107. Hundred and eight, maybe.”

 

Charlie threw his head back against the sofa, once again no match for his former teammate’s glibness.

 

 _I think I’ve seen ice rinks deeper than him and Guy. Easier to talk to, too_.

 

“Okay, how about you shut the hell up and be serious? You know I’m not talking about your stupid polo shirt.”

 

“Okay, fine.”

 

Adam lowered himself into the club chair next to the sofa, taking another drink as Charlie struggled for the right words.

 

“I’m uh, I’m worried about you. A lot of people are.”

 

“Why?”

 

“ _This_.” Charlie gestured towards the littered coffee table and the glass of gin in his friend’s hand, “This is why I’m worried!”

 

Adam just sat back blankly, the words not fully registering.

 

“Okaay, well, I had people over last night, and the cleaning lady doesn’t come until tomorrow…”

 

“That’s not the issue.”

 

“Then what _is_ the issue?”

 

“Okay, how can I spell this out any clearer, Adam? Everyone is saying that you’re a fucking junkie, and from the looks of things, I’d say they’re right!”

 

“Who’s saying that?”

 

“That’s not what’s important!” Charlie’s voice grew louder as he got up from sofa, unable to maintain the semblance of calm any longer. “Ever since you quit playing hockey, you’ve turned into a bigger Jerry Springer episode than your dipshit brother!”

 

Still defiantly calm, Adam sat back in his club chair, propping his feet up on the coffee table as he took another drink.

 

“First of all, fuck you. Secondly, you say that like I just randomly decided to quit playing hockey or something—”

 

“You know that’s not what I meant, dumbass, but come on.”

 

“Come on _what_?”

 

Before the words could stop themselves; before Charlie could quiet down all of his _own_ resentments over a life decidedly lacking in marble fountains and maid services, it all came flying out. Fourteen years of frustration over feeling like the affirmative action bid in Adam’s perfect whitebread life _once again_ spilled across the carefully polished oak floors, dooming any remaining hope of a productive conversation.

 

“Come on and quit acting like you have the world’s hardest fucking life, that’s what. So can’t play hockey? Big fucking deal! Go start a fucking support group with Chip and Crawford for rich assholes who think they have problems.”

 

Looking down at the cane resting against the end table, and the unsightly pudge around his friend’s once svelte waist, he knew he’d said the wrong thing. Before Adam could even respond, he was walking towards the door, desperate to escape himself and the disaster around him.

 

“Go to hell, Charlie.”

 

As Charlie stepped out into the spring sun, the chill in Adam’s voice cut through the warm breeze, and replayed through his mind the entire drive home.


	10. Chapter 10

“Hey.”

 

Looking up, Adam saw Laura standing in the doorway, a pair of charcoal dress pants and a crisp white button down draped over her arm.

 

“You have clothes now.”

 

His eyes glancing up and down, he stopped for a moment to truly take his wife in, for once seeing not the provider of breakfast or tier of ties, but a _person_. A person independent of himself, with wants and needs all her own.

 

In the unforgiving florescent light of his office, he could see the wrinkles in her forehead that he’d been too busy to notice; the dullness in her own blue eyes from getting up in the night to tend to potty accidents and dreams about boogeymen, only to come downstairs and deal with tantrums of the 31 year old variety. He could see that she had grown thicker around the hips; that her designer jeans and cashmere sweaters no longer lay quite the way they had a decade earlier.

 

He could also see the concern in her smile. The way that she’d driven half an hour into the city to make sure that he had a clean shirt. The fact that she was still carrying the same faded Longchamp bag she had in college; still wearing the same loafers that had been re-soled three times.

 

“Thanks”

 

“How are you feeling?”

 

“Like I shouldn’t get into fights with people fat enough to have their own TLC shows.”

 

“Well, yeah.” She smiled, looking down to examine his crooked nose and bruised jaw. “That’s probably a wise rule to live by. I mean, I suspect you could get away with generalizing it a bit further…”

 

“What on earth did you _do_ , anyway?”

 

“I told Brian I fucked him mom.”

 

“Mrs. McGill? I’m…not really sure that would be bragging rights.” She laughed, running her fingers through his neatly groomed mop of hair.

 

“She makes good fried chicken.”

 

“Of _course_ she makes good fried chicken. From the looks of things, she has a fair amount of practice.”

 

“Hey now” He smiled, scooting back in his desk chair so that there’d be room on his lap for a certain toucan loving wife. “Don’t knock the importance of a good fried chicken recipe. I’m sure Scotty’s fucked many a woman to try to score a dinner invite.”

 

Sitting down in his lap, she made herself comfortable; her legs dangling over the side of the armrest as she snuggled into her slightly pillow-y husband.

 

His days of passing for an Abercrombie model might have been long over, but as far as laps to sit in went, he’d only improved with time.

 

“Now _that’s_ a prize!”

 

“Indeed. It’s probably in every Home-Ec textbook.   Might even be part of the curriculum.”

 

“Why do you think I made a C in that class?” She pointed out, peppering a couple of quick kisses along the bottom of his neck near his shirt collar.

 

Leaning back, Adam wrapped his arm around his wife and pulled her in tightly. Taking a deep breath as her face nuzzled into the side of his neck, he stared out the window, thinking of the 18 year old who stayed by his side at every turn. Thinking of the Deerfield grad who gave up her own dreams to help take care of a paralyzed hockey player with questionable social skills and a slightly too large nose.

 

_She was just a kid._

_We both were._

 

“I love you.”

 

“I love you, too.”

 

* * *

 

December, 2003

 

“So. Congratulations.” Julie smiled, sitting down on a barstool next to the groom.

 

Fighting back a laugh, she ordered a glass of merlot, casting an amused glance at his tartan pants and velvet tuxedo slippers…an outfit that looked surprisingly good on Adam, but that had been unfortunate on a few of the groomsmen.

 

Not, she thought, that Merrill and Chip would have looked much better anything else.

 

_You’d think somewhere along the way, one of their ancestors could have at least picked a good looking cousin to marry…_

 

“I know that look, Cat Lady. You’re just jealous that this isn’t _your_ wedding.”

 

“Yeah, the jealousy’s killing me. Now when I have a wedding filled with coke addicts in plaid pants, everyone’s just going to think I’m copying you...”

 

“Come on now, I don’t see you having _nearly_ as many drunk sorority girls. That right there will set it apart.”

 

Julie laughed, thinking about the prim bride who was now on the dance floor chugging from a bottle of Veuve as the bass to Juvenile’s _Back That Azz Up_ vibrated the room’s crystal chandeliers…the largest of which was worse for the wear, thanks to an overzealous bouquet toss.

 

 _I never knew tulips could do that_ …

 

Looking back down at her glass, she paused thoughtfully, trying to decide _what_ she felt.

.

It had been a gorgeous wedding—a candlelit ceremony at Christ Church Winnetka, followed by a reception at the historic Hilton Ballroom. There, surrounded by ornate paneling and views that overlooked the entire midwest, Adam was in his element: The perfect, WASP-y Prince Charming, ready to save the world through good manners and good taste. Even in tartan Brooks Brothers pants, he was a sight to behold, and the closer the wedding seemed to veer towards the edge of disaster, the more delightful Adam became.

 

When two groomsmen could be heard fighting in the rectory before the ceremony, he managed to make the coke fueled brawl seem like festive, pre-wedding boisterousness. When a hushed argument between Laura’s parents left Mrs. Fontaine sobbing into her lobster bisque, Adam was there to make sure that all was well. After his and Laura’s first dance ended in a heap on the floor following Laura tripping over her gown, he was happy to steal a kiss there on the ground…ignoring the painful bump on his head and the sense of humiliation he felt inside.    

 

Still, Julie had heard the muffled whispers.

 

The rumors that nothing had changed for the _better_ since his trip to Hazelden six months prior.  

 

.

“So, how does it feel to be a married man, Mr. Banks?” She finally asked, leaning in towards the man of the evening.

 

Casting a glance towards the packed dance floor, filled with rhythmless preppies each gyrating to a completely different beat, he just gave a tired shrug before taking another drink of his gin.

 

“Like the Baptists had the right idea with that whole ‘no dancing’ thing?”

 

“Well yeah, but they also skip the premarital sex…”

 

Julie laughed as a tsunami of magenta washed over his cheeks and the tips of his ears.

 

 _It’s not my fault that he’s cute when he’s flustered_ …

 

“Now that’s where they were shortsighted.” He pointed out, regaining his composure. “If they wanted to keep kids from having sex, they should let them dance with Larson. I guarantee that _nobody’s_ going to be having sex after that.”

 

“He didn’t need abstinence-only education.”

 

“Nope. God just…really handled that one for him.”

.

A few minutes later, the thumping petered out, replaced by the slow crooning of Louis Armstrong’s _What a Wonderful World_. As the hoardes of sweaty, glassy eyed preppies descended on the mahogany bar for their refills, Adam offered his hand, and the two made their way to the empty dance floor.

 

“You’re not worried I’ll do like Laura?” Julie joked, lightly resting her head against his shoulder as they swayed back and forth under the sparkling chandeliers.

 

_I see skies of blue and clouds of white_

_The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night_

 

Adam wasn’t as steady as he once had been, Julie feeling all of the slight wobbles and missteps that he’d become so adept at hiding.

 

Holding him closely, she knew there would never again be any of the dramatic dips or twirls that had impressed her so back in high school; that the elegant hockey star was now doing well to stand upright. Still, pulling herself in closer to her first love, he was as magical as she remembered, the light scent of his cologne taking her back to simpler days.

 

_And I think to myself what a wonderful world_

 

“Heh, I’ve been falling for you since seventh grade. I’m pretty used to it by now.”

 

* * *

 

The afternoon giving way to evening, the office got quieter as one by one, the other workers all left, ready to rejoin their families after a tiring day. The sunlight that had streamed in through the window all morning had been replaced by the familiar haze of dusk, and as Adam glanced down at his phone, he saw that it was 6:17.

 

Seventeen minutes into Tucker’s hockey game.

 

Glancing back up at his inbox, still filled with unanswered messages, he knew that there was more work to be done. Enough emails and spreadsheets to easily fill another three hours…

 

Any other night, he would have stayed until every item was finished; forever the Hawk who practiced the hardest. Forever the one still working while everyone else was out enjoying their lives.

 

Looking back down at his phone, however, he remembered the afternoon spent building Tyrannosaurus Pepsi with the boys, and the way that Tucker and Will had crawled into bed beside him the next day when he was in too much pain to get up. He remembered the way that they spent all morning together watching _Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood_ reruns on Netflix and eating cookie dough for breakfast. The way that the boys carried on about which superheroes they wanted to be when they grew up; the way that Will decided that his _real_ goal was to be soda machine.

 

 _A sensible plan_.

 

He recalled the betrayal that he felt later that afternoon when Laura shepherded the boys away, determined that they not notice how slurred their father’s speech had become. The mix of feelings that washed over him the next morning when he woke up next to Kookaburra, Tucker’s beloved stuffed elephant that he’d brought down so Daddy wouldn’t have to be alone.

.

Shutting off his computer, he gathered his keys and turned out the light, October’s harsh chill nipping at his battered face as he walked out to his car.

 

Tonight, he was going to be a good father.

 

The kind of father who deserved to wake up next to Kookaburra.

* * *

 

 July, 2005

 

“Adam, we aren’t here to talk about those things. We’re here to talk about you; about how _you_ feel.”

 

_Like I’m going to throw up again._

 

“I’m fine.”

 

“I don’t think you’re fine. If you were fine, you wouldn’t be here.”

 

_Fuuuuuuuuck_

 

Sweat dripping from his brow, all Adam could think about was his extremely pregnant wife back home, trying to get the nursery prepared.  About their trip to Pottery Barn Kids two weeks earlier, and the way that they had decided on pale yellow cabana stripes for the walls. He thought about the crisp the blue and white gingham bedding they’d picked out; the white Pima cotton blanket with the four letter light blue monogram.

 

_Tucker Beauchamp Talbott Banks._

 

He thought back to how they’d picked up copies of _Goodnight Moon_ and _I’ll Love You Forever_ at the bookstore on their way home, and about the nice lunch they’d had at The Minnesota Club, talking about the future. Laughing about how they weren’t going to be like their own parents as the candlelight flickered.

 

His body reeling, he also thought about how he was definitely going to be sick if this therapy session didn’t end _right fucking now_.  

 

“Of course I’m fine. It was just a little mix-up with the pharmacy.”

 

“This is your second time here. There seems to be a pattern of mix-ups…”

 

 _That would be one way of putting it_.

 

“Well, I mean, I’m not perfect, but _this_ isn’t where I belong.”

 

_Not right now. Fuck. I’m about to be a father, for Christ sakes. I’m worse than my own dad…_

 

“Then where do you belong, Adam?”

 

_Hell._

 

“Back at work.” The irritability of withdrawals gnawing at every neuron, he fidgeted around in the maroon upholstered wingback, _trying_ to keep his composure as his stomach turned from the lack of opioids and his mind kept drifting back to the four bedroom Eden Prairie home he’d just moved into. To the fact that this was _not_ the time to locked away at Hazelden, dealing with uncomfortable mattresses and listening to perennial losers tell their sob stories. “I’m supposed to be working right now, not sitting around talking about whether my parents loved me enough or whether somebody touched my private parts.”

 

“Did they?”

 

“Did they what?”

 

“Well, those are rather specific concerns you brought up. Are these issues we need to explore?”

 

_Oh fuck no._

“Oh. No. I didn’t mean it that way. I just meant…I’ve sat through a lot of group therapy by now. As far as I can tell, those are kind of the greatest hits around here. It’s like the _Macarena_ at weddings, but with less dancing and more stories about kid diddling soccer coaches.”

 

_Sounding really well-adjusted here, cakeater. Maybe you can throw in a nice joke about locker room rape to drive home the point that you’re totally not dealing with any deep seated emotional issues here, no siree._

 

“Well, trauma often plays a role in these things. We don’t have to talk about anything until you’re ready, but at some point, I wouldn’t mind us revisiting some of these topics…”

 

 _And I wouldn’t mind jumping off a fucking cliff if it meant feeling better, but you don’t see me doing it_.

 

 _Mostly because there aren’t many cliffs in Maple Grove_.

* * *

 

Walking into the ice rink, the familiar smell made Adam’s stomach tighten and his eyes moisten, a thousand feelings washing over him. In his mind, he could still see Scott chasing him around on the ice, telling him that there was a Zamboni monster who would eat him, and his dad back on the sidelines, laughing at their antics as he sipped his Irish coffee, enjoying a rare good mood. He could hear Brian and Larson arguing about whether Brian’s dad was _really_ a super space ninja as Coach Reilly yelled at them to shut up and ‘pay attention to the fucking game, you damn retards’, and the sound of Brian crying in the locker room afterwards. He could see Julie’s smiling face, and hear the crowds cheering. He could feel his dad’s arms around him after he led Eden Hall to a national championship his junior year, and he could hear the sickening pop of his neck breaking, and he could feel the tears welling up in his eyes as his old number was hung from the rafters, the packed Mariucci arena in complete silence.

 

For twenty years, his first loves and first heartbreaks had all played out on the ice, the events shaping the course of his life.

 

And yet, it had been a decade since he’d seen the inside of an ice rink—once his number was hung and the proper hands had been shook, Laura helped him into the passenger seat of her old 3-Series, and they quietly drove away from the arena, a chapter of his life closed forever as they headed down the narrow snow lined road, back to his new apartment. Back to a world of first floor views and handicap accessible showers; a world for people who wouldn’t be leaving Minnesota.

.

In Salt Lake, he hadn’t been able to do it. He hadn’t made it more than three steps into the lobby before it became too much to bear. His eyes filling with tears, he’d walked back out to the rented Corolla, crying as his brother held him. Telling him that it would be okay when they both knew that _nothing_ was okay.

 

This time, though, he reminded himself of Kookaburra.


	11. Chapter 11

“Daddy!”

 

No sooner had Adam made it through the double doors of the ice rink, Laura and Will came to the entrance to greet him, Will bounding with an excitement that could put the average Labrador to shame. Looking down, Adam couldn’t help but laugh—the boisterous three year old had won the day’s battle over what to wear, his woolen Christmas sweater paired with floral swim trunks and a Darth Vader helmet.

 

_THAT was the sperm that won? What were the guys like who didn’t make the swim team?_

Will still bouncing with excitement, Adam carefully knelt down to his younger son’s level, wrapping an arm around the surfing Darth Vader.

 

“Bubba Wubbles! How is my big guy?”

 

Predictably, the toddler’s exuberance was a bit much for his father’s sense of balance, and soon the two were laying in a heap on the dirty linoleum, Will bouncing up and down atop his dad.

_“Shit. I can’t my dick but I can feel this?”_ Adam thought, staring up at the ceiling as bony knee slammed into his ribs by accident. _“Alanis Morissette can’t touch this level of irony_.”

 

Still, getting a few minutes with his son far outweighed the physical discomfort of being used as a Dad-shaped bouncy castle, and Adam laughed as the three year old filled him in on the day’s adventures of being the world’s first astronaut pirate dolphin. Meanwhile, more than one stranger walked past, trying not to stare at the misfit combo of a battered banker and his sartorially challenged son sprawled across the Formica, the father’s gut jiggling like a water bed with every excited toddler bounce.

 

 _“Yup.”_ Adam thought, catching one of their amused glances, _“This weirdo is definitely mine.”_

…………….

January, 2008

 

“Of course you’re not going to end up like him. You’re not a total dick.”

 

Above, the florescent lights of the waiting room hummed, while a mile away, Scott and Tucker were sitting on a frayed futon, eating Spaghetti-O’s and watching Rambo.

 

His back and hips already in agony from the four hours he’d spent pacing the maternity floor of Abbott Northwestern, Adam had been reduced to laying helplessly across a vinyl sofa, his fingers drumming the backrest at a frantic pace. Larson sat in a chair nearby, his cell phone and a half eaten box of pizza resting in his lap.

 

Pausing the drum solo, Adam twisted from side to side for a moment, trying in vain to work out the worst of a knot in his lower back.

 

“He was probably telling himself the same thing back in the day.”

 

“First of all? Yeah, he was probably telling _himself_ that.” Larson reminded him, toying with the bezel of his diving watch as he talked. “The guy didn’t exactly have a lot of friends. And secondly, I’m _thinking_ he wasn’t the kind of guy to throw out his back pacing the floor. He was probably at the bar across the street muttering something about how ‘This one better not be another damn ‘tard’.”

 

Adam smiled, thinking back to the old pictures from when his parents brought him home from the hospital. In the photos, Scott had on a torn school uniform and a very _un_ -patrician shaved head, courtesy of an attempt at jumping the Breck School fence and a superglue mishap, respectively.

 

 _“It’s too bad they didn’t treat ADHD back then.”_ He thought with a tinge of sadness _. “Things probably could have turned out differently if they had.”_

“Well, yeah, but his heart was in the right place. It can’t be easy being that big of a ‘tard.”

 

“ _You_ would know.”

 

“As would you, Mr. Piss Pants.”

 

Grabbing another slice of pizza, Larson contemplated his reply as he chewed a stray pepperoni.

 

“You piss your pants like, once a week.”

 

“Yup. And I still get laid more than you.”

 

“So does the average priest.”

 

“I sure hope Tucker and Will grow up to be cooler than you…”Adam smirked, finally resting a bit more comfortably as he adjusted the sweatshirt-turned-pillow under his head.

 

“Considering that they’re half you? Good luck with that one.”

 

“I’m still the coolest guy in _this_ room.”

 

“Screw you.”

 

Feeling a little better, Adam returned to to nervously drumming his fingers against the vinyl, while Larson texted his mom to reassure her that yes, Laura was doing fine, no, they were not hungry, and no, she did not need to bring anybody a plate of leftover chicken casserole.

 

All the while, Adam tried to assure himself that Larson was right. That he _wasn’t_ going to be a repeat of his own father. Thinking back to all of the walls and door frames of their sprawling Tudor that he’d been thrown against, he couldn’t help but crack a small smile when he glanced down at the bit of plastic leg brace peeking out from beneath his Levis.  

 

_“Heh, guess there’s not much risk of repeating ALL of his mistakes.”_

After all, his temper was going to be far easier to outrun than his father’s had been.

…

 

Three hours later, Larson had gone home the night, and Adam was sitting in a recliner by Laura’s bedside, holding his newborn son. With the lights dimmed and Laura sound asleep, all was quiet, save for the gentle ticking of the clock on the wall next to him.

 

 _2:47 a.m_.

 

Outside, the city still glimmered below, giving off just enough light for the former hockey star to appreciate his surroundings. Gazing over at his sleeping wife, he smiled when he thought back to his discussion with Larson earlier that night, and the fact that the woman curled up in front of him had indeed blessed him with two children despite of some of his more…unfortunate challenges.

 

 _“It’s one thing to find a woman who’ll pay attention to you when you’re headed for the NHL.”_ He thought to himself, leaning against the beige recliner _. “It’s another to find one who’ll still love you even if you do sometimes pee yourself._

 

In the distance, he could hear the scurrying of doctors and nurses above, struggling to keep a patient alive. As the monitors continued to beep, the scurrying became more and more urgent, until suddenly everything stopped, and all that remained was silence.  

.

Thinking back, he remembered the months spent lying motionless in bed, listening to that same cycle of life and death play out as he pondered whether his new life would ever be worth living. The helplessness of nurses coming in every couple of hours to turn his useless body, and the overwhelming guilt he felt every time he looked over at Laura and noticed the deepening worry lines between her eyes.

 

As horrible as the muscle spasms and nerve pain had been, none of that compared to the pain of knowing that he would never again have a purpose.

 

.

Sitting there, with Will still held snugly in the crook of his arm, he could feel the rhythmic rise and fall of his son’s chest with each breath. He examined the tiny hands and pudgy little feet, using what little movement he had in his right thumb to tickle the round set of toes in front of him.

 

“I can’t promise you much.” He whispered to his infant son, “But I do promise that I’ll do my best.”

 

……………………….

A few minutes later, Will had tired of the human bouncy castle, having instead found a delicious, half-eaten lollipop on the ground nearby that beckoned for his attention.

 

As Laura helped Adam up, he looked over at his son’s find and shook his head.

 

“ _That’s_ my replacement?”

 

“Well yeah. You’re a good dad, but you’ll never be ‘grape flavored and covered in lint’-good.”

 

“That _is_ a pretty impossible standard.” He agreed, pulling his wife into a hug once she had him back on his feet. Leaning back, he tilted his head down and kissed the bridge of her nose, the whole time mindful of his own broken schnoz and swollen face.

 

 _“Pretty sure ol’ Bottle Boy got me out of Christmas card pictures this year.”_ He thought, his self-consciousness giving way to gratitude as he remembered the Santa hats and matching flannel pajamas Laura had ordered two weeks prior.

 

“Tell me about it. I gave birth to the kid, and he’d still rather pour syrup in the DVD player than listen to anything I have to say.”

 

“Atta’ boy. I’m glad to hear I’ve managed to sneak in a few life lessons, after all.”

 

“I really should have become a lesbian…” Laura sighed, a smile creeping up through her cheeks.

 

“And miss out on all this sex appeal?”

 

“Good point.” She laughed, patting a bit of tummy before she leaned in for another kiss. “No way I could miss out on all of this.”

…………………………….

 

July, 2011

 

“Daddy! Daddy!” Tucker shouted, shaking the body in front of him. “Daddy! Wake up!”

 

In the background, the familiar narration of PBS’s Frontline could be heard, William Lyman describing a college basketball controversy in his usual monotone. Upstairs, Laura was putting away laundry as Will played with his action figures, both oblivious to the events unfolding in the den below.

 

As Laura folded fluffy white towels and hung neatly pressed khakis in the boys’ walk-in closets, she enjoyed the summer breeze filtering in through an open window, taking the evening calm for granted.

 

“Wake up. Daddy. Please.”

 

Tucker’s words grew more frantic with every passing second, his five year old sensibilities well aware that something was very, very wrong. Standing at 4”2, he threw all 56 lbs. of his weight into trying to wake his father, tugging at his dad’s blue and white gingham button down and pounding at his chest.

 

“Wake up! Now! Please!”

 

Growing ever more desperate, he tried everything he could to wake his dad, tears rolling down his chubby cheeks as he punched and shook and grabbed at anything he could, hoping _something_ would rouse his favorite playmate.

 

Yanking out a plug of sandy hair, he lost his balance and tumbled to the ground, a steady trickle of blood now running down the exposed patch of his father’s scalp.

 

Still, Adam never budged.

 

“Daddy. Please.”

 

The severity of the situation sinking in, Tucker lay on the floor, sobbing. A chunk of hair now clenched in his fist, he started to realize his dad wasn’t going to be waking up.

 

“Daddy, please.” He whispered, choking back sobs. “Please. I didn’t mean to make you mad. Wake up. Please. I’ll never lick the dog again. Wake up.”

 

No matter how hard he pleaded, nothing changed. Nothing moved. His dad just continued to lie there, nary a sign of life. The moments felt like hours as Tucker curled up on the floor next to the sofa, apologizing for the thousand things he’d done wrong that day; hoping that if Adam knew how sorry he was about smearing peanut butter on the sofa and trying to build a swimming pool in the bathroom, that he’d finally decide to come back.

 

“Please Dad. Please. I’m sorry.”

 

At about that time, Laura came down the steps to investigate the commotion, expecting to find a repeat of the peanut butter mishap or a bumped head. When she saw her husband sprawled across the couch, her heart sank.

 

Even from across the room, she could tell he wasn’t watching Frontline, his arm hanging limply to the side and his chest too still.

 

“Tucker, sweetie, how about you go upstairs and watch some TV in Mommy’s room?”

 

Walking closer, she could see that Adam’s lips were starting to turn blue.

 

“But…Daddy…”

 

“Don’t worry, “ She lied. “Daddy’s fine. He’s just resting. Now go upstairs and see if you can find some cartoons for you and Will.”

 

“Daddy’s dead, isn’t he?”

 

_Why can’t this be like the goldfish I always replaced?_

 

“He’s not dead. He’s just a little sick. Now if you’ll go upstairs, Mommy’s going to call the doctor, and doctor is going to make everything all better.”

 

_Fuck._

Dialing 911 as the tears welled up in her eyes, she thought back to the adorable college freshman standing on the front steps of the Tri Delta house twelve years prior. Even though it was only their second date, as she looked up at him in his navy blazer and khakis, holding a giant bouquet of her favorite white tulips, she’d realized he was special.

 

That he was the kind of guy she wanted to grow old with.

_“You’re not the kind of person who dies like this…”_ She thought, checking his arm for a pulse. _“You’re really not.”_

 

…………………………………..

 

“You did a great job out there, kiddo.” Adam smiled, pulling Tucker into a hug after the game.

 

Looking down at the sandy haired kindergartener in a Hawks jersey, a lump started rising in his throat as he thought about the fact that he wasn’t the one getting to teach his own son to play hockey. That some cheery 20 year old named Skylar with ruddy cheeks and windswept hair was the one getting to do all of the things he’d spent his life looking forward to, while he spent his days gulping down OxyContin and staring at spreadsheets.

 

 _“The fuck kind of name is Skylar, anyway? Like Tyler for birds_?”

 

With a slim waist, pleasant disposition, and a row of perfect white teeth that didn’t have to come out at night, there was no denying that Skylar possessed all of the things that Adam himself lacked…a fact that didn’t escape the former hockey star’s notice.

 

 _Bastard probably knows how to make a grilled cheese, too_ …

 

“I’m really glad you could make it, sir. You have a great kid--”

 

“Thanks. I’m kind of partial to him, myself.” He smiled, an arm draped over Tucker’s shoulder as Will stood on the other side, clutching the hem of his dad’s shirt.

 

“You know, you were my idol back in the day. I wanted to be just like you when I was eight…”

 

Adam could feel that familiar lump in his throat growing ever larger, until it threatened to consume his entire being.

 

He knew which version of himself Skylar was talking about, and he _wasn’t_ talking about the version who’d called Tucker a ‘cocksucking retard’ for spilling a glass of water at dinner the weekend before.

.

 

_I miss me._

.

“Heh, I think you turned out a little better than I did.” He laughed, glancing down at his cane and the pudgy bits that no amount of tailoring could _quite_ hide.

 

“Want to tell that to my manager at Burger Barn?”

 

“I mean, only if we can trade jobs. Those fries are awesome.”

 

“They really are.” Skylar nodded in agreement.

 

“But seriously sir, it’s been an honor to finally meet you. And you really do have a great son.”

 

“Well thanks. And thank you for all that you do.”

……

 

That night, Tucker and Will rode back to Eden Prairie with their dad, bickering in the backseat about who was a bigger doodie dead and who needed to stop looking at whom. Meanwhile, up ahead, the lights of downtown gave way to sprawling green lawns and modest McMansions.

 

Taking in tidy row after tidy row basketball hoops and hockey nets dotting edges of concrete, Adam found himself admiring the bland beauty of it all. It wasn’t necessarily what he’d _wanted_ out of life, but there was a certain charm to it, no less.

 

 _Other people dream their whole lives of things like this_.  

 

“You know,” He finally spoke, glancing into the rearview mirror at the two sleepy boys behind him, now resting against one another. “I love you both. More than anything.”

 

“Love you, too.” Will quietly muttered, his baby blues heavy with sleep.

 

As the boys drifted of to the land of nod, a stillness filled the car, leaving Adam with nothing but his thoughts as he turned left onto Chatfield Lane.

.

Pulling into the curved driveway, he stared up at the towering white columns in front of him, thinking of all that the years had brought. All of the disappointments and failures; all of the nights spent working into the wee hours of the morning, and worse, staring up at the ceiling, contemplating whether Garrett Brown had the right idea when he hung himself in the old Hawks locker room on break from Shattuck their sophomore year. He thought about the credit card bills that he’d taken to burning in the fireplace without opening, and the bottle of vodka in his console. The fact that his dad and Reilly and Riley had all been right when they’d said he would never amount to anything; that he’d just end up another white trash loser who’d never leave Minnesota, forever dreaming of his glory days as he sat on the couch drinking Michelob.  

 

But, he also thought about the two kids in the backseat, and the chocolate chip pancakes Laura made on Sunday mornings, and that warm night a few months earlier when the two of them snuck out of a black tie affair to play in the sprinklers outside. He remembered the warm June breeze on his skin, and the horrified looks of the stuffy old socialites as they discovered a couple of drenched 30-somethings dancing under the oscillating rainfall with their formalwear caked in mud.

 

He thought of paper towel roll swordfights with his boys, and the magic of the first snowfall each year, and of the fact that after 27 years, Mrs. Larson would still send him home with brownies every time he visited.

 

No, he realized, life wasn’t what it could have been.

 

But it also wasn’t what it could have been.

 

 

 

_The end_


End file.
